I. Summary

Recent studies of the Arab world have turned a spotlight on
the poor state of its university education. In 2003, the United Nations
Development Programme (UNDP) Arab Human
Development Report focused on education in the region. The report
concludes, "Knowledge in Arab countries today appears to be on the retreat. . .
. Continuing with this historic slide is an untenable course if the Arab people
are to have a dignified, purposeful and productive existence in the third
millennium."[1] One
important reason for this decline is the lack of academic freedom on university
campuses.

Conditions at universities in Egypt, historically a leader in
education in the Arab world, exemplify the problem. On a mission to Egypt,
Human Rights Watch found that
academic freedom violations pervade the country's system of higher education.
Since the early 1990s, Egyptian academics have faced public condemnation,
judicial convictions, physical violence, and other forms of intimidation from
both government officials and private groups and individuals, particularly
Islamist militants. Among the most publicized cases is that of CairoUniversity
professor Nasr Hamid Abu Zaid, who had to flee the country after being declared
an apostate by a national court for his scholarship on the Quran. AmericanUniversity in Cairo (AUC) professor
Samia Mehrez had a course book with sexual content censored and suffered
attacks in the press and parliament. And Saadeddin Ibrahim, an AUC sociologist
who had conducted research projects on controversial political and religious
subjects for an independent research center, endured three years of trials and
prison time before being acquitted. Although some of these events date back
several years, they remain vivid in the minds of Egyptian academics.

The assault on academic freedom is more subtle, but more
extensive than the headline cases indicate. Repression by government
authorities and private groups has affected every major component of university
life, including the classroom, research, student activities, and campus
protests. Censorship stops professors from teaching certain books. Permit
requirements for surveys block research in the social sciences. University
officials and police limit student activities outside the classroom. State
security forces often respond violently to campus demonstrations. Such
widespread abuses stifle debate and the free exchange of information, thus
preventing Egyptian students from receiving a quality education and Egyptian
scholars from advancing knowledge in their fields.

State and non-state actors alike contribute to the poor
state of academic freedom in Egypt.
State security forces illegally detain and sometimes torture activist students
who run for student union or who demonstrate on campus. The government applies
additional pressure through appointed deans and restrictive laws. Most of the
non-state interference comes from Islamist militants, whose political activism
is religiously driven. This group intimidates professors and students through a
variety of tactics, including litigation and physical assaults. One professor
accused Islamist militants of creating an "atmosphere of terror" in which
scholars worry their lectures or research will be condemned as blasphemous. In
some cases, these sources of repression feed on each other. Academics appease
Islamists because they fear increased state repression and accept state
repression because they fear the wrath of Islamists.

Years of repression have created an environment of
self-censorship in Egyptian universities. Professors and students acknowledge
that there are certain subjects-chiefly politics, religion, and sex-that they
will only discuss in a limited way. They say they feel free to say whatever
they want, but only provided they do not cross one of the taboo "red lines."
Self-censorship can be as damaging to higher education as direct repression. It
is also a sign that many Egyptian academics no longer resist, or sometimes even
recognize, violations of academic freedom.

Institutional restrictions have exacerbated the academic
freedom violations on national campuses, contributing to the deterioration of
quality education in Egypt.
The state controls faculty appointments and promotions, infringing on
university autonomy. A rigid approach to learning discourages creativity
throughout the university system from entrance exams to Ph.D. programs and
deprives students of the power to choose freely their academic pursuits.
Inadequate funding has caused professors to seek alternative places of
employment and led to decrepit facilities. The Ministry of Higher Education has
developed a plan for future reform, but it is too soon to determine if the
government has the money and the will to implement it.

The pervasive violations by state and non-state actors and
fearful responses by academics have created a stagnant educational environment.
Professors and students repeatedly told Human Rights
Watch that Egypt's
universities are no longer centers of creative thinking. Higher education has
become largely rote, and people take the safe path. "It's an unexciting
environment. It is not stimulating on a daily basis. . . . Most free spirits
are seething with frustration," said Ann Radwan, executive director of the
Binational Fulbright Commission in Cairo
and long-time observer of Egyptian academia. "Fear leads people to think it's
better to have continuity, to keep things quiet."[2]
The general sense of apathy not only interferes with the quality of education
but also affects society at large. Universities should serve as the training
ground for a country's leaders as well as a forum for discussing solutions to
its problems. In the present atmosphere, they fail to do both.

This report presents the findings of a three-week research
mission to Egypt
from February 12 to March 5,
2003, supplemented by telephone interviews and archival research
from 2003 to 2005.[3]Human Rights Watch interviewed twenty-seven
professors and sixteen students from Cairo and Alexandria and had access
to published accounts summarizing the experiences of many others. It also met
with Egyptian government officials, including the minister of higher education
and a state censor, and about two dozen lawyers, journalists, NGO representatives,
and foreign diplomats who have worked on academic freedom issues. In addition, Human Rights Watch reviewed international and
Egyptian laws and university histories. Research focused on CairoUniversity
and the AUC, Egypt's
oldest and most prestigious public and private universities, respectively. It
also involved interviews with people from `Ain Shams, Alexandria, and Hilwan universities. This
scope covers the most famous and highly regarded academic institutions in the
country.

Since the Human Rights Watch
mission in 2003, Egyptian professors and researchers have taken some steps
toward promoting academic freedom. In fall 2003, a group of professors
established the Ninth of March Committee for the Independence of Universities.
The committee is named for the date in 1932 on which Rector Ahmed Lutfi
al-Sayyid of CairoUniversity resigned to
protest the government-ordered dismissal of renowned professor Taha Hussain.
The committee has raised awareness of the lack of academic freedom at annual
events on March 9 and has sent letters to the university administration to
protest interferences by the security police in education.[4]
More recently, the Egyptian Association for Support of Democracy published a
report on the October 2004 student elections in four universities, and CairoUniversity
historian Raouf Abbas published an autobiography that includes anecdotes about
government

Professors and students
protest just outside the gates of CairoUniversity on February
22, 2003.The university's domed Great Festival
Hall can be seen in the background.

2003 Bonnie Docherty /
Human Rights Watch

interference in university life.[5]
Such actions represent important initiatives by members of the academic
community on behalf of academic freedom.

In addition to illuminating the troublesome state of
Egyptian academia, this Human Rights Watch
report explains how the restrictions on academic freedom violate international
law. The principle of academic freedom derives in part from the internationally
recognized right to education, which is enshrined in the Universal Declaration
of Human Rights (UDHR) and the International Covenant on Economic, Social, and
Cultural Rights (ICESCR), which Egypt
has ratified. According to the Committee on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights
(CESCR), "the right to education can only be enjoyed if accompanied by the
academic freedom of staff and students." Academic freedom encompasses both
rights for individual members of the university community, such as freedom of
opinion, expression, association, and assembly, and autonomy for institutions,
which must be free from state interference with the university's educational
mission.

In its pervasive repression of academic freedom, Egypt
violates international law. The government stifles people seeking to
participate, as individuals or groups, in all aspects of academic life. It
maintains police, administrative, and legal control over the universities,
depriving them of institutional autonomy. Egypt should move to correct these
violations and infringements through legal and administrative means. It should
also prevent attacks on academic freedom by private individuals or groups.

The international community, meanwhile, should recognize the
systemic problems with higher education in Egypt and find constructive avenues
to press for change. While some of the most egregious cases already have
attracted outside attention, foreign governments and media have not always
acknowledged the seriousness and pervasiveness of academic freedom violations
in Egypt.
In its 2002 Human Rights Report, the U.S. Department of State, for example,
condemned the prosecution of Saadeddin Ibrahim and its "deterrent effect" on
freedom of expression. It stated incorrectly, however, "The Government did not
restrict directly academic freedom at universities."[6]The 9/11 Commission Report recommends
that the United States
spend money to "rebuild scholarship, exchange, and library programs" and to buy
textbooks in the Arab world.[7] While
financial assistance for resources, technology, and facilities could help
remedy existing deficiencies, such funds will be wasted if the restrictions on
academic freedom detailed below are not addressed. Large donors to Egypt, such as the United States and the World Bank,
should better familiarize themselves with the academic freedom violations in
that country and use their leverage to help end them.

II. Recommendations

Human Rights Watch makes the following key recommendations
to promote and protect academic freedom in Egypt.Chapters five through seven contain more
detailed recommendations at the end of each section.

1. The Egyptian government should cease using state
security forces to intimidate and physically abuse professors and students.

State security forces have created a climate of fear on university
campuses. They observe selected classes to keep discussions from crossing red
lines and sometimes beat students seeking to express themselves by means of
posters or speeches. Police detain, physically abuse, and in at least one case
allegedly have tortured candidates for student union elections. They also
sometimes respond with excessive force to peaceful demonstrations. Professors
and especially students described the police presence as one of the major
obstacles to academic freedom in higher education. The government should forbid
security forces from playing any role on campus other than the strictly limited
one of protecting public order.

Since 1994, public university deans have been appointed by
rectors, who are in turn appointed by the state. As implemented, this process
gives the state too much control over internal university matters and favors
for deanships professors who support the ruling National Democratic Party (NDP).
Such deans frequently interfere with academics' freedom of opinion and
expression. Professors and students told Human Rights
Watch of cases in which deans monitored classroom
discussions, cut off exchanges on controversial subjects, denied politically active
professors contact with students, and blocked leftist and Islamist students
from running for student government. Human Rights
Watch was told that, in many cases, deans also closely
scrutinize student activities, including student clubs and other forms of
association on campus, and stifle expression that threatens to cross red lines.
Deans must resist political pressures and act according to academic rather than
political or other criteria.

3. Egyptian
legislators should amend or abolish several laws that interfere with academic
freedom.

Besides government security forces and state-appointed
deans, Egyptian laws violate the principles of academic freedom. Law No.
20/1936, which allows censorship of all imported course books, should be
abolished. Presidential Decree No. 2915/1964 establishes permit requirements
for social science research that effectively block research on controversial
topics and should be amended. The University Law of 1979 gives state-appointed
deans unwarranted power over student activities and should be amended to allow
the formation of political and religious clubs and to remove the "good conduct"
requirement for student union nominees. Finally, the Emergency Law has been
used to authorize arbitrary detention and unfair trials that intimidate and
punish academics who cross red lines. It should be repealed.

4. Egyptian
authorities should ensure that academic freedom is protected from threats and
acts of intimidation by Islamist militants.

International law holds states responsible for the actions
of their citizens and residents as well as themselves, and in this case, Egypt
is responsible for protecting its academics from abuse by Islamist militants.
The government should end its own violations, such as a censorship regime, that
provide poor role models to private actors. State representatives should also
oppose threats from individuals and groups on campus and in the press and
protect academics' rights to teach and research subjects of their choosing.

Islamist militants have used physical, legal, and media
attacks to stifle Egyptian intellectuals. In particular, they intimidate
professors and students so that they are afraid to assign course books or
research topics dealing with religion or sex. Egyptians who oppose such
activities-including members of the media-should speak out publicly against
them.

6. The international
community should recognize the systemic problems in higher education in Egypt
and use its leverage to combat them.

Members of the international community, including the United States and World Bank, have promised or
been asked to fund education in Egypt.
Such funding may enhance resources, technology, and facilities, but the system
of higher education will not flourish without the elimination of pervasive
restrictions on academic freedom. Donors should use their diplomatic and
financial leverage to push for such change. The UNDP should also continue to
monitor education in the Arab world and call attention to violations of
academic freedom.

III. Academic Freedom: Definition and Legal Protections

Academic freedom gives members of the academic community the
right to conduct and participate in educational activities without arbitrary
interference from state authorities or private individuals or groups, including
popular political, religious, or other social movements. It is a broad
principle that protects professors and students and applies to the complete
range of academic pursuits-formal and informal, inside the classroom and
beyond. International law requires states to respect academic freedom, a
principle based on a series of basic and widely accepted human rights. In many
countries, domestic law provides explicit protection for academics. Egypt
is bound to ensure academic freedom for its citizens by both the treaties it
has ratified and its constitution, which includes safeguards for the relevant
rights.

Right to Education

The principle of academic freedom stems in part from the
internationally recognized right to education. This right is enshrined in
Article 26 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights of 1948 (UDHR)[8] and
Article 13 of the International Covenant on Economic, Social, and Cultural
Rights of 1966 (ICESCR) to which Egypt has been a state party since 1982.[9] According
to the official commentary on the ICESCR, Article 13(2) requires education to
"include the elements of availability, accessibility, acceptability, and adaptability."
This means there must be a sufficient number of institutions; these
institutions must not discriminate and must be physically proximate and
economically affordable (except for higher education, which need only be
accessible "on the basis of capacity" of the individual); the education must be
appropriate for students and "of good quality"; and it must be flexible enough
to respond to different students and times.[10]

These conditions alone, however, do not guarantee the right
to education. The Committee on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights (CESCR),
which interprets the ICESCR, has stated that "the right to education can only
be enjoyed if accompanied by the academic freedom of staff and students."[11] Academic
freedom is particularly important in higher education. Its community of young
adults and highly educated teachers and researchers includes individuals more
inclined to be politically engaged and, therefore, likely to be attacked by
intolerant authorities or private citizens.

The CESCR's definition of academic freedom consists of two
parts. The first component relates to members of the academy-professors and
students, as individuals or groups. In its comment on Article 13, the committee
wrote,

Members of the academic community, individually or
collectively, are free to pursue, develop and transmit knowledge and ideas,
through research, teaching, study, discussion, documentation, production,
creation or writing. Academic freedom includes the liberty of individuals to
express freely opinions about the institution or system in which they work, to
fulfill their functions without discrimination or fear of repression by the
State or any other actor, to participate in professional or representative
academic bodies, and to enjoy all the internationally recognized human rights
applicable to other individuals in the same jurisdiction.[12]

According to this definition, academic freedom encompasses a
series of other widely accepted human rights, including freedom of opinion,
expression, association, and assembly. These civil and political rights are
enumerated in the UDHR and legally binding on states parties to the 1966
International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR).[13]Egypt
ratified the ICCPR in 1982.

The second component of academic freedom relates to the
universities themselves rather than members of the community. The CESCR's
comment explains, "The enjoyment of academic freedom requires the autonomy of
institutions of higher education."[14]
In order to serve as a forum where academics can freely exchange knowledge and
ideas, universities must be independent of the state.

While governments are the primary protectors of academic
freedom, CESCR also places duties on individuals and institutions. Members of
the academic community have the "duty to respect the academic freedom of
others, to ensure the fair discussion of contrary views, and to treat all
without discrimination on any of the prohibited grounds."[15]
Universities, meanwhile, must be held accountable, especially for their
management of state funding. "Given the substantial public investments made in
higher education, an appropriate balance has to be struck between institutional
autonomy and accountability. While there is no single model, institutional
arrangements should be fair, just and equitable, and as transparent and
participatory as possible."[16] Academics
and universities not only are beneficiaries of academic freedom, but also play
an important role in ensuring its protection.

Rights Belonging to Members of the Academic Community

Freedom of Opinion

Freedom of opinion is the first building block of academic
freedom. Education involves not only the acquisition of knowledge but also the
development of ideas. The CESCR specifically mentions that academics are free
to "develop . . . ideas" and "express . . . opinions."[17]
Without freedom of opinion, academia would produce only information with no
interpretation or analysis. International law protects this right in the ICCPR,
Article 19(1) of which says, "Everyone shall have the right to hold opinions
without interference."[18] The right
is absolute; the law prohibits interference under all circumstances.[19]

It can be difficult to judge whether a government or private
actor has violated this right because that requires understanding what is in
someone's mind.According to the U.N.
Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Expression, "What exactly constitutes an
impermissible interference with the freedom of opinion is not an easy matter to
determine. In general, it is possible to speak of such an interference when an
individual is influenced against his will and when this influence is exerted by
threat, coercion or the use of force."[20]
Censorial pressures can also become routinized to the point where many people
take for granted that certain opinions are unacceptable and fail to recognize
unlawful restrictions on their academic freedom.

Freedom of Expression

Freedom of expression is an essential part of academic
freedom because it allows for the exchange of knowledge and ideas. As the CESCR
explains, academics are free to pursue this exchange "through research,
teaching, study, discussion, documentation, production, creation or writing."[21] Education
is a collective as well as an individual undertaking, which depends on
discussion and debate. In the classroom, professors need freedom to teach and
students to ask questions and try out ideas. In research, academics must have
access to knowledge provided by others and the ability to present their own
scholarship publicly. Freedom of expression is also important in less formal
forums, such as student clubs and campus demonstrations.

International law protects freedom of expression. Article
19(2) of the ICCPR states, "Everyone shall have the right to freedom of
expression; this right shall include the freedom to seek, receive and impart
information of all kinds, regardless of frontiers, either orally, in writing or
in print, in the form of art, or through any other media of his choice."[22]
Expression may not be limited by content or form. The provision also encompasses
freedom of information, which protects an individual's right actively to seek
information.[23]

International law allows freedom of expression to be
restricted only in certain circumstances. According to Article 19(3),
restrictions must be "provided by law," meaning they must be laid out in
advance in statute or common law, and they must be "necessary: a) For respect
of the rights or reputations of others; b) For the protection of national
security or of public order (ordre public),
or of public health or morals."[24] To be
necessary, a restriction "must be proportional
in severity and intensity to the purpose being sought and may not become the
rule."[25]
International law prohibits pre-publication censorship; academics should have
the opportunity to present their work before the state rules it impermissible.[26] Although
the law allows some limits to be placed on freedom of expression, they are
appropriate only under exigent circumstances and must be interpreted narrowly.[27]

Freedom of Association

University life is not confined to the classroom and library
or laboratory. It also includes gatherings, formal and informal, of members of
the community. In its discussion of academic freedom, the CESCR specifically
mentions the freedom "to participate in professional or representative academic
bodies."[28]
International law protects such formal gatherings under freedom of association.
According to Article 22 of the ICCPR, "Everyone shall have the right to freedom
of association with others, including the right to form and join trade unions
for the protection of his interests."[29]
People have the right to form associations, and those associations must be free
to act on behalf of their members.[30]
Although the article only names trade unions, freedom of association extends to
groups of varying forms and purposes. "Religious societies, political parties,
commercial undertakings and trade unions are as protected by Art. 22 as
cultural or human rights organizations, soccer clubs or associations of stamp
collectors. Moreover the legalform of an association is basically
unrestricted," says a respected treatise on the ICCPR.[31]
On campus, therefore, freedom of association provides protection not only for
teachers' unions, a type of trade union,[32]
but also for student unions and student clubs.

As with freedom of expression, the ICCPR allows for some
limited restrictions on freedom of association. These restrictions must be
"prescribed by law" and "necessary in a democratic society."[33]
"Necessary" again refers to proportionality. The addition of "in a democratic
society" means the restrictions must "be oriented along the basic democratic
values of pluralism, tolerance, broadmindedness and peoples' sovereignty."[34] The
permitted purposes for interference are essentially the same as in Article 19,
except that "public safety" is added to the list.[35]

Freedom of Assembly

Freedom of assembly protects less formal gatherings on
campus, most notably student and faculty demonstrations. According to the
CESCR, academic freedom includes the "liberty of individuals to express freely
opinions about the institution or system in which they work."[36] One of
the most common forums for expressing criticism of the government is a
demonstration. Such gatherings are important for the political life of a
country. In many countries, campus demonstrations are often the first sign of
broader public discontent with the government policies. Article 21 of the ICCPR
says, "The right to peaceful assembly shall be recognized."[37]
It gives professors and students the right to organize and participate in
campus protests or other gatherings, as long as they are peaceful.[38] The
restrictions in Article 21 are almost identical to those in Article 22.

Rights Attached to the Institution: University Autonomy

Academic freedom extends not only to members of the academic
community but also to educational institutions. According to the CESCR,
university autonomy is a prerequisite for the exercise of professors' and
students' individual rights. The committee defines autonomy as "that degree of
self-governance necessary for effective decision-making by institutions of
higher education in relation to their academic work, standards, management and
related activities."[39]
Educational institutions should be able to make their own rules, administer
themselves, and be free of control by state security forces. Autonomy is
especially important for universities because they provide a forum for
high-level debate on controversial topics. When they are subject to state
interference, universities cannot serve as a safe place to engage challenging
issues and intellectual life suffers.

Protection from State and Non-State Actors

Both government officials and private citizens and groups
can threaten academic freedom.Under
international law, states must take the necessary steps, including
implementation of domestic legislation, to protect the rights that make up
academic freedom from such threats. According to Article 2(1) of the ICCPR,
"Each State Party to the Covenant undertakes to respect and to ensure to all individuals within its territory
and subject to its jurisdiction the rights recognized in the present Covenant,
without distinction of any kind, such as race, colour, sex, language, religion,
political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other
status."[40] The
obligation to respect means states must not restrict rights, unless allowed
under exceptions such as those found in Articles 19, 21, and 22. The obligation
to ensure requires states to take proactive steps, when necessary, to guarantee
the rights laid out in the covenant.[41]
The ICESCR, in which the right to education is enshrined, imposes a similar
duty on states parties.[42]

International law also provides protection from actors
independent of the state.The CESCR
explains that individuals have the "duty to respect the academic freedom of
others."[43] The ICCPR
places the burden for enforcing that duty on its states parties. Article 2's
clause about ensuring rights means that states parties are obligated to prevent
the violation of the covenant by private parties.[44]
The ICCPR explicitly lays out some actions states can take. The duty to ensure
extends beyond the ICCPR's specific examples, however; states must take any
actions necessary to guarantee third parties do not infringe on academics' legal
rights.[45]

Self-Censorship

Direct repression of academic activities often leads
individuals to censor themselves. Professors or students who have been
repressed may be too frightened to exercise their rights again. Academics who
observe the intimidation or punishment of their colleagues may choose not to
test the system because of either fear or desire to avoid the bureaucratic
hassle. Such a chilling effect on freedom of opinion and expression can be as
great a threat to academic freedom as direct repression. It also discourages
academics from participating in associations or assemblies. International law
holds states responsible for preventing such interferences with academic
freedom. According to Article 2 of the ICCPR, states parties must "ensure" that
individuals have the rights laid out in the covenant. This obligation includes
eliminating the repression that causes self-censorship and creating an
environment in which members of the academic community feel free to exercise
their rights.

Other Human Rights Protections

As outlined above, the principle of academic freedom
encompasses a range of basic civil and political rights. The CESCR recognizes
that the principle extends beyond the most obviously related rights and
includes "the liberty . . . to enjoy all the internationally recognized human
rights applicable to other individuals in the same jurisdiction."[46] States
routinely ignore this provision. For example, they often use torture, arbitrary
detention, unfair trials, and extrajudicial killings, all forbidden under
international law, to silence their critics in the academy. Such actions
represent both egregious abuses of universally accepted human rights and
further restrictions on academic freedom.

Egyptian Law

In many countries, Egypt included, domestic law
provides additional protection for academic freedom. The Egyptian constitution
includes four articles that specifically discuss education. Article 18 states,
"Education is a right guaranteed by the State. It is obligatory in the primary
stage and the State shall work to extend [its] obligation to other stages."[47] The
constitution thus lays out the right to education, which, as discussed above,
requires academic freedom. Article 18 concludes, "The State shall supervise all
branches of education and guarantee the independence of universities and
scientific research centres, with a view to linking all this with the
requirements of society and production."[48]
This part of the article specifically mentions one of the requirements for
academic freedom under international law, i.e. university autonomy. The
article's call for state supervision and the mandate to link education to
"society and production," however, could be read to authorize inappropriate
limits on that autonomy. The remaining three education articles state that
"Religious education shall be a principal subject in the course of general
education" (Article 19), "Education in the State educational institutions shall
be free of charge in its various stages" (Article 20), and "Combating
illiteracy shall be a national duty for which all the people's energies should
be mobilized" (Article 21).[49] The
latter two deal more with the right to education than academic freedom per se.

Other provisions of the Egyptian constitution protect the
basic human rights essential to academic freedom. Article 47, which guarantees
freedom of opinion and expression, says, "Every individual has the right to express
his opinion and to publicise it verbally or in writing or by photography or by
other means within the limits of the law. Self-criticism and constructive
criticism is the guarantee for the safety of the national structure."[50] The
constitution also devotes an article to the protection of research. According
to Article 49, "The State shall guarantee the freedom of scientific research
and literary, artistic and cultural invention and provide the necessary means
for its realisation."[51] The
constitution protects gatherings of academics with provisions related to
assembly and association. Article 54 states, "Citizens shall have the right to
peaceable and unarmed private assembly, without the need for private notice.
Security men should not attend these private meetings. Public meetings,
processions and gatherings are allowed within the limits of the law."[52] Article
55 gives citizens "the right to form societies as defined in the law" as long
as their activities are not "hostile to the social system, clandestine or have
a military character."[53] These
articles cover the main components of academic freedom.

Despite constitutional protections that are generally in
line with international law, Egypt
has failed in practice to protect academic freedom. As will be shown below, the
government has created and fostered a system of repression that stifles
independent thinking and the free exchange of ideas. State and non-state
repression as well as the self-censorship they cause pervade all areas of
university life, including the classroom, research, student activities, and
campus demonstrations.

IV. Background

Egypt
has long been the intellectual and cultural center of the Arab world. It is
home to al-Azhar, one of the oldest universities in the world, and was among
the first Arab countries to establish a national secular university, almost a
century ago. The latter, which became CairoUniversity, not only served as a model
for other institutions in the region but also provided Egypt with scholars, political
leaders, and opposition figures. Over the course of the twentieth century, Egypt's
rapidly expanding university system faced periodic violations of academic
freedom. In recent years, those attacks have become sometimes less obvious but
more pervasive, threatening the freedom of individual academics and the
autonomy of educational institutions in unprecedented ways. Whether Egypt's
universities can continue to serve as intellectual role models for the region
is seriously in doubt.

Rise of the National Universities

Egypt's
intellectual leadership began with the founding of al-Azhar. Shi`a Fatimids
established the religious university in Cairo
in the tenth century; about two hundred years later, the Ayyubids under Saladin
turned it into a Sunni institution. As Egypt became "the undisputed center
of Islamic cultural and intellectual life,"[54]
students from across the Arab world came to al-Azhar to pursue Islamic studies.
The formation of the Ottoman Empire eventually shifted political and cultural
power to Istanbul,[55] but
al-Azhar remained (and remains) a significant force in the Islamic world,
contributing to the resistance against Napoleon and providing religious leaders
for the region.[56]

At the end of the nineteenth century, as part of a broad
reform movement, the search began in Egypt for an alternative to
al-Azhar's religious education. It was found wanting in its preparation of
young Egyptians to meet the demands of the modern age. France and England had turned away from their
traditionally Christian universities and either created new institutions or
revamped and secularized the old ones.[57]
Inspired to modernize their own society, Egyptian politicians, aristocrats, and
intellectuals started discussing options for forming a secular university in Cairo.

-

The minarets of al-Azhar tower over medieval Cairo.Founded in the tenth century, al-Azhar is the
oldest university in Egypt
and one of the oldest in the world.It
continues to serve as a pan-Arab center for Sunni education. 2003 Bonnie Docherty / Human Rights Watch

The EgyptianUniversity, later renamed CairoUniversity,
opened in 1908. It was created as a private, liberal arts college that sought
"knowledge for its own sake."[58] A
university committee policy statement explained, "The firm foundations on which
this great structure [of higher education] will be built can only be the
introduction of the fields of knowledge which are now neglected in Egypt, like
history, the arts, the humanities, and the higher sciences which elevate the
individual and his people and make a nation great among nations."[59] Research
was an important part of CairoUniversity's mission. As
one young professor explained, instead of merely presenting knowledge, "the
university tries to discover the unknown, criticizes the achievements in
learning, introduces arguments, replaces the old by the new, destroys one
viewpoint and builds up another."[60] These
early mission statements provide an important point of contrast to the state of
education in Egypt
today.

The university's founders also recognized the need for
autonomy. They sought to keep politics off campus and avoided hiring graduates
of al-Azhar. They intended to have "no religion but knowledge."[61] European
professors dominated the first generation of faculty while promising Egyptian
students were sent abroad to train for future teaching positions.

In 1925, three years after Egypt
gained independence from Britain,
the private university became part of the country's first state university. The
original institution had insufficient funds and facilities to meet the growing
demand for higher education. It was turned into a Faculty of Arts in an
expanded institution that added a Faculty of Science and schools of law and
medicine. As a condition of accepting reorganization, however, the private
university demanded "as much autonomy from the minister of education as
possible."[62] The new
university symbolically distinguished itself from al-Azhar, building its
Western-style campus on the opposite bank of the Nile.
A clock tower, rather than a minaret, dominated the campus. Although founded on
a European model, the state university served as an important symbol of an
independent Egypt,
even appearing on national postage stamps.

Over the coming decades, CairoUniversity, then known as Fuad I
University after the king and former rector, could no longer meet Egypt's
needs for higher education. A second national university opened in October
1942. Originally named Faruq I University, it ultimately became AlexandriaUniversity. It followed Cairo's
model, but made college education more accessible to Egyptians outside Cairo. Eight years later,
the state added Ibrahim PashaUniversity, now `Ain
Shams, to its system. It was built in Cairo on
the east bank of the Nile. By 1952,
enrollments at the three state universities totaled 36,622.

After the fall of the Egyptian monarchy in 1952, the state
popularized the national universities. Gamal Abd al-Nasser[63]
believed education should be open to the people and made universities free in
July 1962. The result was an explosion in the number of students. During his
years as president, CairoUniversity's student
population grew two-and-a-half times, to 50,000. Nasser
also shifted the emphasis of the national universities from liberal arts to
science and technology and opened several institutes that provided more
vocational training. Anwar Sadat, who succeeded Nasser
in 1970, rejected his predecessor's economic views but generally continued his
educational policies. The government continued to provide free access to the
universities despite the fact that the emphasis on quantity of students led to
a decline in quality of education. Expansion included the creation of HilwanUniversity,
another institution in the Cairo
area.

Over the past fifty years, the national university system
has grown dramatically. Today it consists of twelve universities, spread
geographically from Alexandria in the northwest
to Suez Canal in Isma`ilia in the east to SouthValley
in Qina in the south. Branch campuses extend as far south as Aswan. According to the most recent available
statistics, more than 1.1 million students are enrolled and about 200,000
graduate each year.[64] In 1999-2000,
120,000 graduate students attended the national universities,[65] and the
number of faculty members reached 30,486.[66]
The system also includes a number of technical and higher institutes that
provide vocational training in two to four years of study. The founders of CairoUniversity
might be pleased that Egypt
has a firmly established university system, but as this report will show, they
would likely question the direction it has taken.

The AmericanUniversity in Cairo
(AUC)

Shortly after the creation of the EgyptianUniversity, a group of American
missionaries founded the AmericanUniversity in Cairo
(AUC). It began as a secondary school in 1920. In 1928, AUC graduated its first
university class and enrolled its first female student. The school was modeled
on other missionary schools in the Middle East, including the SyrianProtestantCollege, which later became the AmericanUniversity
of Beirut. AUC,
which moved into the EgyptianUniversity's original
home in Tahrir Square,
offered an American-style liberal arts education in English. It added master's
degrees in 1950.[67]

The school started small, but its influence grew as the United States
became a world leader. In 1945, it enrolled 134 students, compared to CairoUniversity's
10,534. Statistics from around the same time show its student body consisted of
forty-eight percent Christian, twenty-two percent Jewish, and thirty percent
Muslim. After World War II, AUC became a more important player in Egyptian
society. By the 1960s Muslim students outnumbered Christians. The school's
graduates included Nasser's daughter and Hosni
Mubarak's wife.

Located
at the edge of Tahrir Square,
this building houses the administration of the AmericanUniversity in Cairo.It served as the original home of CairoUniversity
when it was founded in 1908.

2003
Bonnie Docherty / Human Rights Watch

AUC is now the most elite university in Egypt. In fall
2003, it enrolled 3,963 undergraduates and 867 master's students. Of those,
89.3 percent were Egyptians.[68] Although
more integrated than previously into Egyptian society, it maintains its
commitment to "the ideals of American liberal arts and professional education."[69] Its
mission statement says, "As freedom of academic expression is fundamental to
this effort, AUC encourages the free exchange of ideas and promotes open and
on-going interaction with scholarly institutions throughout Egypt and other parts of the
world."[70] AUC
represents an alternative to Egypt's
public university system. It provides a university education that is liberal
arts-based, private, and international to students willing and able to pay
tuition.[71]

Influence of Egyptian Universities

Egypt's
secular universities began to influence politics and society shortly after
their creation. During much of the twentieth century, they trained national
leaders and provided forums for challenging that leadership. They also served
as models for the new institutions of higher education springing up around the
Arab world. The significance of these universities thus extended beyond their
role as educators of Egyptian youth to shapers of Egyptian and Arab society.

During the first half of the twentieth century, CairoUniversity
produced most of Egypt's
professionals, politicians, and intellectuals. Its first rector later became King
Fuad I, who reigned from 1917 to 1936. Between 1908 and 1952 almost all cabinet
ministers who were not army officers graduated from the university. In addition
to grooming the country's leaders, CairoUniversity was a national symbol at a
time when Egypt was seeking
its independence from Britain.
"In France, with its
prestigious grandes coles, the University of Paris
has not been nearly so vital for national life, nor has Harvard in the
decentralized United States.
. . . Oxford and Cambridge
revived later in the [nineteenth] century, but they were still far less
important on the national scene than CairoUniversity has been in Egypt,"
writes historian Donald Reid.[72] Later in
the century, CairoUniversity had to share
its influence with new members of the state system. It also lost control of the
national leadership; all three of Egypt's
presidents since 1954 graduated from the MilitaryAcademy.
While CairoUniversity's influence has diminished,
it remains the most prestigious state university.

Historically Egypt's
universities trained not only society's leaders, but also citizens willing to
challenge the status quo. "Students from CairoUniversity . . . were in the forefront
of demonstrations in 1919, 1935, 1946, 1951, 1968, and 1972-73 which
significantly affected the course of Egypt's history," Reid writes.[73] These
demonstrations usually criticized government policies, with students often
focusing on what they considered the state's insufficiently militant policy
toward Israel.
The student movement peaked in the 1970s when leftists "fought against big
government."[74] In 1972,
for example, more than three thousand students organized a sit-in at CairoUniversity
to protest Israel's
continued occupation of the Sinai Peninsula
and to expose domestic problems. They printed leaflets, arranged for food and
medicine to be distributed, and guarded the gates. "It was very organized. Egypt's
intellectuals joined. It showed at the time students were a strong and
organized force. [The movement] began to decline in the next couple years,"
said `Imad Mubarak, a recent graduate and student activist, who now works at
the HishamMubarakLawCenter, named after his
father.[75]
Engineering professor Saad el-Raghy remembers that the students in his faculty,
who were "fed up" with Israel's
presence in the Sinai Peninsula, threw stones
and protested for hours. "Outside the gates it was like a battlefield," he
recalled.[76] The
student movement has since lost much of its power due not only to infighting
and generational changes, but also to repression.[77]
Nevertheless the memory of these days remains vivid in the minds of activists
today.

As one of the oldest in the region, Egypt's state university system influenced
similar institutions created later in the rest of the Middle
East. The new universities that sprung up in the 1950s and 1960s
looked to Egypt
for guidance. "CairoUniversity . . . became
the prime indigenous model for state universities elsewhere in the Arab world,"
Reid writes.[78] The other
possible models-private American missionary schools, European colonial
institutions, and Turkish universities whose significance faded with the fall
of the Ottoman Empire-could not compete.
Graduates of Egypt's
universities became professors in the new foreign national universities. In
1974, for example, Egyptians represented seventy-one percent of the teachers at
the eight-year-old KuwaitUniversity. Egyptian
universities opened satellite campuses in Khartoum,
Sudan, and Beirut, Lebanon,
in 1955 and 1960, respectively.CairoUniversity
also attracted foreign students from around the region, who returned home with
Egyptian training. Egypt
continues to export academics, especially to the Gulf States, but today Egyptians express
concerns that the influence flows in the other direction and is not friendly to
academic freedom.

The History of Constraints on Academic Freedom in Egypt

Following on the heels of independence, the creation of a
national university system gave hope to Egypt's academics. "CairoUniversity
was thought of as an establishment where you could get a free and secular
education apart from the complex of religious education at al-Azhar. . . . CairoUniversity
was the beginning of new era. . . . [It] included a lot of space for people of
different intellectual movements and backgrounds," said a professor who
currently teaches at the university.[79]
Nevertheless, Egypt's
secular universities faced threats to academic freedom from their earliest
days. The challenges ranged from attacks on individuals to interference with
university curriculum. While these largely isolated incidents did not
significantly hinder the universities' influence at home and abroad, they
foreshadowed the crisis that erupted shortly after Nasser's
takeover of the state in the 1950s and the systemic and insidious repression
that characterizes Egyptian campus life today.

In the first half of the century, university and state
officials occasionally charged individual academics with blasphemy. In 1913,
for example, the EgyptianUniversity sent Mansur
Fahmi to the Sorbonne to prepare for a position in its philosophy department.
When the university administration learned Fahmi had written his dissertation
on the condition of women in Islam, it said he had defamed Islam by accusing it
of mistreating women and claiming that the Prophet Muhammad had written the
Quran for personal reasons. The university stripped him of his promised
professorship and confiscated copies of the thesis it had funded. He was banned
from government posts and only returned to teaching seven years later.

More established scholars were also vulnerable. In 1926,
eminent scholar Taha Hussain was at the center of "one of the most famous
Arabic literary battles of the century."[80]
Al-Azhar condemned Hussain's book On
Pre-Islamic Poetry as blasphemy and sparked a parliamentary debate. Unlike
Fahmi, Hussain received support from the rector of his university and the
incident died down. These threats to academic freedom demonstrate the
difficulties Egypt's early academics faced trying to find a balance between secular
and religious, and imported and more locally rooted approaches to education.

As the national university system began to grow in size and
influence, a new government regime moved to co-opt it. Nasser, who took power
in 1954, sought to shape higher education to serve his political purposes. He
wanted academia to articulate an ideology for his brand of Arab nationalism and
tried to enlist its support by controlling the campuses. "[F]reedom of thought,
speech, and action was squelched. Police informers saturated the campus, and
professors never knew the exact limits of permissible debate," Reid writes.[81] One
academic described the blow as a watershed in university history. "Academic
freedom in Egypt
ended in 1954 when the soldiers threw out the liberal professors and decided to
turn Egyptian universities into a government bureau," said poet and former
professor Ahmad Taha.[82] Nasser
also emphasized technical learning rather than "knowledge for knowledge's
sake," CairoUniversity's original mandate. As a
result, the Faculties of Engineering and Medicine replaced those of Law and
Arts as the most prestigious and popular. While such disciplines are important
fields of study, the head of state's influence over curriculum represented a
loss of university autonomy. The universities' institutional problems started
in this era, too. The numbers of students increased dramatically after Nasser eliminated tuition, but the quality of education
declined because the faculty and facilities were not expanded at the same time.

Under Anwar Sadat, the universities reached their peak of
activism and then were stifled by state repression. Sadat assumed control of Egypt after Nasser
died in 1970. During the early years of his tenure, he eased restrictions on
the academic community, removing police from campus, allowing professors to
elect their deans, and facilitating more student activities. Afraid of the
left's increasing influence, however, Sadat eventually cracked down on student
activism with the University Law of 1979, which placed restrictions on student
unions and other groups. He also surreptitiously encouraged Islamists in an
effort to combat leftist influences; members of this group soon started
pressuring their classmates to observe their interpretation of strict Islamic law.
After signing the Camp David accords with Israel, Sadat's alliance of
convenience with the Islamists ended. A squad of militant Islamists from the
radical group al-Gihad assassinated
him on October 6, 1981.
Sadat not only left a legacy of direct state repression on campus but also
unleashed sociopolitical forces that continue to challenge academic freedom
today.

Egypt's
universities now operate under the control of President Hosni Mubarak's
government,[83] and
academic freedom violations continue. An Egyptian journalist from al-Ahram, the country's leading paper,
told Human Rights Watch, "The
government is against all freedom, whether left or right, the existence . . .
not [of] a particular group but [of] independent universities."[84] The
threats that universities face today may sometimes be less visible than under
Nasser or Sadat, but as detailed below, they are pervasive and insidious.
Incursions on academic freedom are destroying careers, restricting knowledge,
and stifling creativity throughout Egypt's higher education system.

Egyptian Universities Today

The structure that represses academic freedom today has been
built by state and non-state actors and by academics themselves. The Egyptian
government uses police, political appointees, and laws to control all areas of
university life. Islamist militants, meanwhile, have used physical violence and
public attacks to shape the content of higher education. A climate of fear has
led professors and students to censor themselves and to avoid discussion of
certain subjects.

In Human Rights Watch
interviews with professors, researchers, students, commentators, and officials,
the existence of so-called "red lines"-taboo subjects-emerged as the central
obstacle to academic freedom in Egypt.
Egyptians use this term to describe boundaries that cannot be crossed on or off
campus. Red lines encompass three controversial subject areas that are
particularly subject to scrutiny-politics, religion, and sex.

Academics agree, for example, that criticism of President
Mubarak and his family has been completely off limits. "Some people say if
anyone talks about the president you will be arrested," said Mai Mustafa, an
`Ain Shams student.[85] This area
includes discussion of pertinent subjects such as who will succeed the
president when he dies or retires and, according to some professors, comments
about certain senior officials.[86] "There
are implicit red lines, for example, the persona of the president, talking
about succession, family members of the president," said a political scientist
at AUC.[87] The red
line does not extend to all politics or criticism of the government. "You can
talk about the lack of democracy but not the family of the president," Mustapha
Kamel al-Sayyid said.[88] Egyptians
can debate politics, but without using names.

Neither state nor
society tolerates criticism, or even innovative interpretations, of Islam.
"Religion is all red unless otherwise stated," AUC researcher Reem Saad said.[89] The boundaries of what is prohibited are
broader and less clear than for politics. "In my case [as a political
scientist], there is more room than [there is] for religious issues. . . .
Religious issues are highly sensitive," CairoUniversity
professor Amr Hamzawy said.[90] Islamists, who care less about political
subjects, apply considerable pressure in the area of religion. Relations
between Muslims and Copts (Egyptian Christians) also fall under this
restriction. AlexandriaUniversity professor
Nadia Touba said, "You [might] stay away from issues of Muslims and Christians
today. Before it didn't make a difference but today it makes a difference. You
don't want to offend anyone. We prefer to avoid [the topic]."[91]

Public discussion of
sex is considered contrary to the religious and cultural traditions of Egypt.
At the national universities, professors said they voluntarily stay away from
books that challenge the sexual mores of the Muslim world. For example, vivid
descriptions of sex or discussions of homosexuality and extramarital sex are
off limits. "If something has sex, it's not appropriate for the culture. . . .
[Y]ou have to respect that. . . . Why would we choose [these books]? We
wouldn't feel comfortable teaching them," English professor Dalia El-Shayal
said.[92] At AUC, censorship of course books has
illuminated this red line. The state censor and Islamists have worked together
to ban books that deal with sexual topics.

While politics, religion, and sex are the main red lines,
other topics are dangerous to discuss in today's universities. According to
some academics, criticism of the military is usually off limits.[93] Relations
with Israel
are also a touchy subject for those who challenge the prevailing view. For
example, a professor who is willing to speak with Israeli professors is
condemned as "supporting normalization," even if he or she opposes the Israeli
government's policies.[94]
"[Discussions of] Israel and
the Middle East are biased and unethically
presented to the students. It's OK to express your opinion, but they should
give students the opportunity to get information and come up with their own
opinions," said Margo Abdel Aziz, an education specialist at the U.S. Embassy.[95] Public
condemnation of such controversial topics quickly leads to self-censorship.

According to one observer, the repression on Egypt's
campuses today is a reflection of changes in Egyptian society. "In society in
general, the amount of freedom is getting less and less. Academic freedom as
one of the signs of freedom in general is bound to be affected," the observer
said.[96]
Violations of academic freedom, however, also exacerbate the problems of
society. They threaten to isolate Egypt from the international
community and to create an educated class lacking the skills and knowledge to
address the country's problems and unable or unwilling to criticize the status
quo.

V. Government Repression

State-imposed limits
on academic freedom pervade Egyptian universities. Academic life, in Egypt
as in all countries, can be divided into four major areas: the classroom,
center of teaching and learning; research, professors' work outside of the
classroom; student activities, including in sports, arts, service, and
politics; and campus demonstrations, where students and professors gather to
express their views on political questions or school policies. Using a variety
of instruments, the Egyptian government interferes in each of these areas.

Instruments of Repression

The Egyptian
government uses three main tools, in various combinations, to stifle academic
freedom: a pervasive police presence on campus, the political appointment of
key administrators, and a series of laws that regulate internal affairs produce
a university system under strict control of the state. "University education in
Egypt
cannot produce proper intellectuals," said Ahmad Taha, a poet and former
professor. "It is nothing more than a government office."[97] Using these instruments of repression, the
state dictates what material can be taught and studied, restricts what opinions
can be expressed and how, and interferes with meetings of professors and
students. In so doing, it undermines the autonomy universities need to protect
academic freedom and violates basic human rights.

Police Presence

Different branches of the state police, under the authority
of the Ministry of the Interior, monitor most aspects of state university life.
University guards are stationed at campus gates and have offices in each
faculty. Plainclothes members of the state security forces roam campuses to
stop spontaneous expression, such as speeches or posters. The police also hire
or coerce students into spying on each other. Those belonging to the student
club "Horus" are notorious for intimidating their fellow students; this club,
or usra, which has branches at the
major universities, works for President Mubarak's National Democratic Party (NDP)
and receives financial and moral support from the activities department in each
faculty.[98] Together
these forces strive to silence activist students and deter other, less
political students from joining them. They suppress specific expression while
creating a general climate of fear.

University guards control access to the campus, keeping
people both out and in and heavily scrutinizing politically active students in
particular. They make it very difficult for visitors to enter the university,
and students of various political leanings told Human
Rights Watch of being detained or searched at the gates. Iman
Kamil, a self-described socialist who graduated in 2000, said the `Ain Shams
guards denied her entry several times even though she presented her university
identity card.[99] Nadir
Muhammad, a

Muslim Brother and third-year student at CairoUniversity,[100] said
that guards routinely harass him when he enters campus. If they find he is
carrying religious tapes or magazines, they confiscate the material and detain
him for a couple hours.[101] The
university guards also sometimes block exits. To keep student and faculty
demonstrations from spilling into more public areas, they close the gates and
confine demonstrators to campus. The use of state security forces to monitor
university behavior affects private as well as national universities. Guards
are stationed at all gates at the AmericanUniversity in Cairo. They check identification cards to
screen visitors and close the gates to contain demonstrations.

Members of the state security forces intimidate students
with scare tactics. For example, they call students on their cell phones to
advise them they are being watched. Alternatively, they call students' parents
to tell them they should stop their children from "causing trouble." Family
members then apply the pressure the state desires. "It works well, especially
among girls. Parents are so frightened, they prevent them from going outside
and they stop being involved," said Kamil, whose parents received such a call when
she was in school.[102] As
described in detail below, this is just one of the many means that security
forces use to limit student expression on campus. AUC students said they
suspect plainclothes police mingle with the crowd on their campus, too. "The security
forces penetrate the university," a theater professor said.[103]
Although it is difficult to prove, this suspicion is a sign of the fear
academics feel.

-

A CairoUniversity
student scales campus gates to hang a banner during a protest on February 22, 2003.State-appointed university guards initially
closed the gates in an attempt to contain a leftist demonstration of professors
and students. 2003 Bonnie Docherty /
Human Rights Watch

While some faculty members decry the presence of security
forces, others see it as a necessary safeguard. For the most part, police leave
professors alone,[104] but that
does not prevent many from resenting government interference in university
life. "One of our demands for the last twenty years was to get police off
campus," said CairoUniversity professor
Sayyed el-Bahrawy.[105] Other
faculty members said security forces posed no academic freedom problems and
helped keep campuses safe. "I'm happy the security forces are there. . . . I'm
glad they don't let in anybody [to campus]. Otherwise it would turn into a zoo
because of the huge numbers of the faculties," said Dalia El-Shayal, an English
professor at CairoUniversity.[106] Student
protests make some professors ambivalent about the police presence because
demonstrators occasionally burn faculty cars and destroy property. A professor
from `Ain Shams said, "The security is intimidating, but what do you do when
students get completely out of hand [during demonstrations]? I have mixed
feelings."[107]

Minister of Higher Education Moufid Shehab defended the
police presence.[108] He noted
they take orders from the rector and deans, not from officials outside campus.
These administrators, however, represent the state, not autonomous
universities. The minister also said that the university guards are "at the
university only for order, not to intervene."[109]
Nonetheless, students and professors repeatedly told Human
Rights Watch that the constant presence of security forces on
campus and the ways in which they are used by university authorities inhibit
freedom at the universities.

Political Appointments

The Egyptian
government also controls national universities, the primary source of higher
education in Egypt,
through politically appointed rectors and deans. The state selects university
rectors, or presidents, whose responsibilities include overseeing the
"scientific, educational, administrative and financial affairs" of the
institutions.[110] In 1994, it reversed a twenty-two-year-old
policy of letting individual faculties elect their deans and gave the
appointment power to rectors.[111] Minister of Higher Education Shehab said
that the change was necessary because elections had involved dirty campaigns
and quarrels between professors. While Egypt is not the only country with
appointed deans, professors continue to decry the move.

Faculty members
complain that the appointment process gives the state too much control of
internal university matters. Mustapha Kamel al-Sayyid, a political scientist at
CairoUniversity, said the deans allow the
government to have a dangerous presence on campus.

It's been bad since [the system changed]. All rectors are
appointed by the government and are usually NDP [President Mubarak's ruling party]
members. Deans are appointed by the rector and therefore have the ambition of
becoming rector. They would be unhappy with any action critical of the
government. It's an unhealthy atmosphere. We feel deans are the eyes of the
government.They don't restrict
actions, but it creates a feeling of discomfort. The deans say things pleasing
to the government. It reflects badly on an atmosphere of freethinking and
debate.[112]

His colleague Amr
Hamzawy described the appointment process as part of the government's move
toward increasingly "latent" control, which involves state "integration in the
apparatus itself."[113] Speaking about the evolution of state
repression, Hamzawy said, "There is a different notion of control. Between the sixties
and eighties, there was direct control. It eased in the early nineties. Now
there is latent control-by regulation, co-opting people, getting critical
ability to be controlled by integration in the apparatus itself." He views the
appointment of deans, whose job includes "controlling staff members," as part
of this systemic restriction of academic freedom.[114]

The appointed deans
wield great power in the academy. They attend lectures, approve guest speakers
and research trips, and assign responsibilities to professors.[115] They can abuse these powers for political
ends. For example, a dean at CairoUniversity punished Sayyed
el-Bahrawy for his leftist political activities by keeping him away from
students. The dean refused to let prospective students visit el-Bahrawy in his
office in December 2002 and has denied him approval to supervise clubs. "The
dean last year told me it is prohibited [for me] to go to demonstrations or
speak with students about politics," he said.[116] A dean at Dar al-`Ulum, a faculty at Cairo
University,[117] punished Islamist professors by closing all
but one of their offices in 2000. In the aftermath, "[t]here were fifty
professors [sharing] one room. The dean believed it was a way to punish
Islamists because he said they used their offices to spread Islam," a professor
said. Twelve months passed before the administration reopened the offices.[118] The system leaves professors no recourse for
redress. "If you have a criticism, it wouldn't reach higher [than the dean]
because everyone wants to please their boss. We don't have a hand in running
the university," said an assistant lecturer in the Faculty of Arts.[119]

The switch from
election to appointment of deans left the disenfranchised professors feeling
powerless and cynical. Salah al-Sayyid al-Sirwi of HilwanUniversity
said the system "shows how the state can always control the universities and
what happens inside."[120]Aida
Seif El Dawla, a psychiatry professor at `Ain Shams, described the policy as an
"insult." "They entrusted us with the education of a whole generation taking
care of mental health, but not [with choosing] someone who does administrative
work."[121] An Islamist professor from Dar al-`Ulum
described the switch to appointment as the end of the "only free election
allowed in Egypt
at all."[122] He said a professor in his faculty who
nominated herself and received only two votes during an election was later appointed
dean.[123]

Although they have
no say in the composition of university administration, students as well as
professors are affected by the appointment system. "It's very obvious when you
compare how deans used to deal with students before and after the law. The
conduct of deans is not very good," said `Issam Hashish, a professor in Cairo's Faculty of
Engineering.[124] Deans determine who can run for student
union and must approve student clubs and public forms of expression. As will be
discussed below, they have used this power to interfere with student activities
that might challenge the government.

When Human Rights Watch asked Minister of Higher
Education Shehab about these concerns, he said that he would consider a system
that combines election with nomination. For example, the professors could elect
three candidates, from whom the rector would choose one. Or the rector could
present a slate of three candidates, on which the professors then vote. A
proposed new university law offers an opportunity for a change in policy, but a
return to elections is unlikely.[125]"Democracy is not always an election. . . . I personally am against the
idea of a pure election," the minister said.[126] However deans are selected, they must be
free from political pressures and act according to academic rather than
political or other criteria. In Egypt
today, this is not the case.

Laws and Regulations

The state's third instrument of academic repression is a
series of national laws that impinge on campus affairs. The University Law of 1979,
which governs the structure of the administration and student activities,
exemplifies state interference with the internal workings of the universities
via legal means.[127] The law,
213 pages in its English translation, gives deans approval power over student
union nominees and student clubs. `Imad Mubarak, recent graduate and lawyer,
described this law and the presence of security forces as the two major
obstacles to freedom of expression on campus.[128]
Other laws target freedom of expression in general and, in the process, limit
academic freedom. Most notably, Law No. 20/1936 requires that all imported
printed material, including course books, be reviewed by the censor's office.[129] The
academy, like the rest of society, has also felt the effects of Emergency Law,
under which Egypt
has been governed almost continuously since 1967.[130]
In February 2003, the government renewed the law, which gives authorities
extensive powers to suspend basic liberties, for another three years. It
authorizes the arrest of suspects at will and their detention without trial for
long periods; the referral of civilians to military or exceptional state
security courts whose procedures fall far short of international standards for
fair trial; the prohibition of strikes, demonstrations, and public meetings;
and the censorship or closing of newspapers in the name of national security.[131] This
report will discuss the implementation of these laws, and others, in more
detail below.

Academic Freedom Violations in the Classroom

In the classroom, the
center of academic life, professors and students meet face to face to exchange
knowledge and ideas and to discuss them from various perspectives. The Egyptian
government interferes with this exchange through a variety of censorship
mechanisms. State statutes restrict academic curriculum by legalizing
government review of course and library books.Professors at the national universities, who are state employees, censor
the opinions of their students during class discussion. Without free access to
information and ideas, the learning process becomes routinized, repetitive, and
restrictive.

Censorship of Course and Library Books: AUC Case Study

The Egyptian state
controls the classroom through censorship of course books. The national
universities, which generally rely on a rigid curriculum of textbooks and
classics, rarely challenge traditional strictures, but censorship has greatly
affected the curriculum at the AmericanUniversity in Cairo. As a purely liberal arts institution,
AUC tends to use more diverse and daring books. As an American university, it
teaches most of its classes in English and therefore needs to import books from
abroad. Both categories of books are vulnerable to the official censorship in Egypt.

Under authority of
Law No. 20/1936, the Ministry of Information screens all imported books and
periodicals. The statute does not apply exclusively to academic literature, but
it facilitates state interference at the heart of the educational system. The
two relevant articles state:

Article 9: In order to maintain the public order, it is
permissible to prohibit printed matter that is produced abroad from entering
into Egypt,
and this prohibition can come as a special decision from the Committee of
Ministers.

From that follows the need to prohibit the reprinting of
this printed matter as well as its publication and distribution inside the
country.

Article 10: The Committee of Ministers also has the right
to ban the distribution and handling of printed matter of a sexual content as
well as that which addresses religions in a way that could destabilize public
peace.[132]

The law thus gives
the state power to censor books in the three major red line areas: politics,
religion, and sex.

A multistep
censorship process screens all books imported by the AUC bookstore, including
course books. The store stocks an average of 15,000 titles and 1,000 course
books and has a sales volume of 9.4 million Egyptian pounds (LE), or U.S.$1.5
million, each year.[133] When the bookstore receives a new shipment
of books, it submits an invoice with a list of titles to the censor's office.
The office requests to review certain titles, and AUC delivers copies. Because
it does not keep good records, the censor's office often asks to review
previously approved books, slowing the process and increasing the chances of an
overturned decision. After review, the censor tells AUC whether a book is
acceptable as is or prohibited. In some cases, a book can be altered to be made
acceptable. For example, the bookstore has pasted stickers over illustrations
of the Prophet Muhammad, such as one in a book from India, because Islam prohibits
images of the prophet. Religious books, which must also be sent to al-Azhar,
can take longer to clear. If there are no problems, the process takes a couple
weeks.[134]

Books with titles
relating to Egypt
or to red line subjects face the greatest risk of censorship. In an order from
February 4, 2003, for example, the censor requested to review thirty-eight
books, including those with the following titles: Social Life in Egypt, Serpent
of the Nile, The Question of
Palestine, Shi`ite Islam, Ecstasy, and The Ultimate Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, a work of fantasy.[135] Bookstore manager Mike Zaug said the censor
rarely asks for textbooks but does scrutinize works on politics or classics
known for their frank sexuality, like Lolita
and Lady Chatterley's Lover.[136] Zaug reported that one hundred titles were
banned in the first three years after his 1998 arrival at AUC.[137] As of February 2003, the most recently
banned item was a Penguin Map of the World that showed the Egypt-Sudan border
as contested. When Human Rights Watch
asked the censor about the map, he replied, "We have a very clear border. . . .
The only maps we go by have a straight line."[138]

Because the
censorship system relies on titles, it is often rather arbitrary. Literature
professor Ferial Ghazoul said the censor banned three of four books in her
Gender and Literature course in the mid-nineties. She suspects that he picked
out Toni Morrison's Beloved, Alice
Walker's In Love and Trouble, and
Assia Djebar's A Sister to Scheherazade
because the titles mentioned the word "love" or referred to an Arab tradition
of sexually explicit literature (Scheherazade is the heroine of the frequently
bawdy The Arabian Nights). The fourth
book, Ahdaf Soueif's In the Eye of the
Sun, discussed both politics and sex but was never reviewed and thus not
banned.[139] The state also sometimes bans English
versions of books available in Egypt
in Arabic because the import law facilitates the process.[140]

An official in the
censor's office defended his department's work as upholding Egyptian
traditions. "Anything that is obscene or immoral should be censored. [So
should] anything that doesn't go by our traditions as Muslims and anything that
concerns blasphemy of religion and national unity between Muslims and Copts,"
he said. Asked for clarification, he repeatedly used examples of books with
explicit discussions of sex but did not address more borderline works, like the
novels and texts from AUC. "I don't think it is against human rights not to
allow things like pornography because we are an oriental society with religion
and ethics and tradition."[141] The censor said he believed politics were
less controversial because Egyptians can criticize their government. Asked
about works discussing President Mubarak, he responded, "I don't see anything
about the president or attacking him. I don't think anything issued worldwide
attacks the president. Nobody ever attacked him."[142] The censor did acknowledge that times are
changing with technology. "People are different. It's not the sixties anymore.
. . . We have an open society and [the world is a] 'small village' as they
say," he said.[143] Because Egyptians can access almost any site
on the Internet, censorship of publications may be in the future a less potent
means of repression.[144] Zaug said, "They need to do it [screen
books] now, but with the way the world is going, they will have to stop."[145]

The state censorship
system has adversely affected the AUC library, the premier English-language
library in Egypt.
Like the campus bookstore, the library submits its packing slips to the
censor's office. The censor then reviews selected books and orders some to be
banned. In a compromise worked out about three years ago, after a national
scandal over teaching of the Moroccan autobiographical novel For Bread Alone,[146] the library keeps banned books on reserve so
that they do not circulate but can be used in the library. The computer
database specifically states that books may not be photocopied. Currently
seventy-eight of the library's 400,000 volumes are on reserve. Examples include
classic literature, such as Lolita by
Vladimir Nabokov; contemporary Arabic literature, such as Cites of Salt by Abdelrahman Munif; books on contemporary politics,
such as Israeli-Egyptian Relations
1980-2000 by Ephraim Dowek and For
the Future of Israel by Shimon Peres and Robert Little; and works on Islam
in general or in contemporary society, such as Islam, A Concise Introduction by Neal Robinson and No God but God: Egypt and the Triumph of
Islam by Geneive Abdo.[147]

Between February
2003 and May 2005, the library added eleven additional books to its reserve
list. The additions included eight duplicate copies and three new titles-The Black Book by Orhan Pamuk, The Body in Islamic Culture by Fuad I.
Kuhri, and Invisible Life: A Novel by
E. Lynn Harris. While new books were added, none was removed from the list
during that time.[148]

State
censorship places restrictions on the AUC library, shown here in a courtyard
view.In a compromise reached with the
Ministry of Information, the library keeps officially banned books on
non-circulating reserve.

2003
Bonnie Docherty / Human Rights Watch

AUC Dean of Libraries Shahira el Sawy emphasized that she
was content with the present system. "We have a very good relationship with the
government. We have been able to obtain
permission for books that are questionable for research. . . . They trust us and
have confidence in us. We care about education and learning. We have no other motives,"
el Sawy said.[149] The official in the censor's office said the
state distinguishes between books for sale and those used for research. "We
never even try to stop anything imported by the AUC library for research," he
said.[150]

The system is precarious,
however, and the library is grateful for what appears to be at best a poor
compromise. Like many professors, the librarian accommodates government
restrictions, satisfied to obtain some books and unwilling to challenge the
general censorship. "The system is working well. We are so pleased to have the
books. . . . It's a way to come to a good compromise," said el Sawy.[151] Although the arrangement allows for access
to the volumes, the library should be free to determine which books belong on
its shelves. The censorship of the library affects not only the AUC community
but also Egyptian academia at large; given the poor quality of libraries at
national universities, many academics rely on AUC's collection for research.[152]

Censorship of the Arts

The state censorship
system that has limited options for course reading lists and library holdings
has restricted other parts of classroom and extracurricular life. In this case,
the Ministry of Culture plays the lead role.[153] It reviews all films imported into the
country, including those used for teaching, and like the Ministry of
Information, it uses a somewhat arbitrary system. An AUC theater professor
said, for example, that the Ministry of Culture cut the last ten minutes of the
school's copy of Easy Rider but
ignored the more provocative and sexually explicit Caligula.[154] The Ministry of Culture also vets student
plays. A censor reads the text of the play and attends a rehearsal. In the case
of one play, the censor told the director to "cut all sex," referring to a
scene with a hug. To raise awareness of the problem, the AUC theater professor
had the actors freeze while the stage manager passed by with a sign saying "cut
by censor."[155] On another occasion, the state completely
shut down a 2001 AUC production of Bay
the Moon, a play by Mahmoud El Lozy. It called the play "anti-Egyptian"
because it criticizes government policies and tells the story of an Egyptian
man and an American woman.[156]

Class Discussion

At the national
universities, restrictions on class discussion are the major challenge to
academic freedom in the classroom. Some professors and students described
feeling direct pressure from the administration and police. Seif El Dawla, a
psychiatry professor at `Ain Shams, said it took her three years to persuade
the administration to allow her to teach a graduate level unit on human rights
for mental patients. Although she received the approval, she limited discussion
of the topic to one lecture and did not put the material on the exam.[157] In 2000, the state-appointed dean at Dar
al-`Ulum prohibited a professor from teaching for a year because he had
expressed Islamist views in the classroom. "The dean went to the classroom and
told the students [their professor] wouldn't be teaching because he did bad
things."[158] The administration told another Islamist
professor and his colleagues not to speak about certain topics or to "speak
softer."[159] Professor Amr Hamzawy said his dean
sometimes attends public lectures or conferences. "If he senses [government]
opposition in the atmosphere, he will stand up to rearrange matters," Hamzawy
said.[160]

Hamzawy also said he
has heard that a member of the security forces attends classes and reports on
what happens. Students have a similar impression of being watched. Tamir
Sulaiman Ibrahim, a 2002 graduate of CairoUniversity described the
police presence in the classroom as "constant on the pretext of keeping order
and controlling any form of student collective movement." He continued, "Also
the professors sometimes summon the police inside the classrooms in order to
make sure that the proper conduct and order is kept in class as the classrooms
are quite big and can contain more than 2000 students at a time."[161] Even if such incidents are rare, the
perception of police presence is enough to discourage free and open classroom
discussion.

Students face
additional restrictions from their classroom professors who impose red lines on
class discussion. Bassam Murtada, a first-year student at CairoUniversity's
Faculty of Law, described two controversial areas-religion and politics. The
former comes up in his classes about Shari'a law. "It's very hard to express
anything about religion. You can't criticize or contradict. The people who
teach it are very strict religiously," he said.[162] Restrictions on politics apply to questions
about both internal laws, particularly the Emergency Law, and international
law. Murtada said, "We don't talk about Israel as a state, its status in
the system or legitimacy as a state. If you try to ask about the legal status of
Israel,
you are shut up by the professor."[163] Margo Abdel Aziz, an education specialist
and long-time observer of Egyptian academia at the U.S. Embassy, echoed
Murtada's analysis about Israel
and class discussion in general. "There is not freedom of opinion for students.
Some professors would encourage, tolerate, respect [students' points of view].
The majority expects falling into line," she said.[164] The intimidating atmosphere created by
administrative and police oversight encourages professors to stifle productive
intellectual exchange on important subjects in Egypt's classrooms.

Long before university, Egyptian students are conditioned to
regard censorship in the classroom as acceptable. Journalist Bahega Hussein,
for example, described how the Ministry of Education censored the romantic
subplots in plays taught in secondary school. "It creates a generation of boys
and girls. . . who find everything can be treated as against their own
tradition and country. When they reach the university they cannot appreciate
freedom," Hussein said.[165] Samia
Mehrez and other professors blame the rigid educational system for producing
weak university students. "Students are heir to a national education system
based on hierarchy and oppression and memorization. It kills their brains;
thinking in itself is horror because if they do, they are defying the authority
of the teacher," Mehrez said.[166] This
early training makes it more difficult for professors to explain the dangers of
censorship.

Conclusion and Recommendations

State interference
in the classroom hurts the core of academic freedom by influencing what topics
are taught and how they are discussed. Egypt's censorship of course books
violates the freedom of expression of professors and authors. While the ICCPR
allows states to restrict this right on certain grounds, including for the
protection of public order and public morals, such restrictions must be
interpreted narrowly. According to a treatise on the covenant, ordre public encompasses "prevention of
disorder and crime."[167] The treatise also states, "Typical examples
of interference with freedom of expression to protect public morals include prohibitions of or restrictions on
pornographic or blasphemous publications," two types of books the censor
mentioned.[168]Egypt has laid out its restrictions
in the law, as required by the ICCPR, but it has applied them far too broadly.
A map indicating that the Egypt-Sudan border is contested is unlikely to cause
public disorder. Routine scrutiny of all imported books touching on religious
or sexual themes and continued censorship of many such titles cannot be
justified as "necessary" to protect public morals. Finally, screening books
before they are imported may be interpreted as a form of prior censorship,
which is always prohibited under international law. The same legal argument
applies to state censorship of the arts, including films for classes and school
plays.

Government
restrictions on class discussion violate freedom of expression and in some
cases freedom of opinion. Students and professors should be able to exchange
knowledge and ideas in the classroom without pressure from administrators or
police. State-employed professors who stifle student discussion for arbitrary
reasons further restrict freedom of expression. They also interfere with
freedom of opinion. Students receive only partial information or no information
at all on a range of subjects and are deprived of the opportunity to develop
their own positions.

Human Rights Watch recommends that

The state repeal Law No. 20/1936, which
allows censorship of imported publications.

Libraries be free to determine their
holdings and to establish which books belong on reserve.

Censorship of plays and films on
campuses cease.

Police be kept out of classrooms.

Deans not intrude upon lectures for the
purpose of intimidation.

Arbitrary Interference with Academic Research

The Egyptian government maintains strict control over
research in certain disciplines. Academic research is a place to advance
existing knowledge and ideas. By formulating new questions and seeking answers
to them, professors make discoveries and challenge assumptions in their
specific fields. In Egypt,
however, professors, particularly social science professors who rely on surveys
and fieldwork to investigate contemporary issues, face enormous obstacles. "If
you talk to anyone, research is a big problem," said Reem Saad of AUC's SocialResearchCenter.[169] The
state restricts who can research what and severely punishes those who overstep
their bounds. In the process, Egypt
interferes with the central role of education in advancing society's
intellectual development and runs the risk of stagnation and isolation in a
fast-paced and globally interconnected world.

Permit Process

The government regulates research by requiring permits for
certain kinds of investigations. "It's extremely hard to formally do research
on many areas of politics and religion in this country," an AUC sociologist
said. "It's a serious restriction."[170]
In particular, the government has set itself up as a "gatekeeper" for
statistical research.[171]
Researchers who want to conduct surveys or large numbers of interviews must
apply to the Central Agency for Public Mobilization and Statistics (CAPMAS) for
a permit. The decree creating CAPMAS says that individuals cannot "publish any
publications, results or statistical data or information from any source except
from the reality of statistics of CAPMAS. The statistics that are not included
in the programs of CAPMAS may not be published without an approval of CAPMAS."[172] The
application, directed to the general director of CAPMAS's General Department
for Security, requires information on the survey subject; sample size, type,
duration, and geographical distribution; and the researcher's degrees.[173]
Professors seemed unclear, however, about the exact requirements. When asked
how big a survey required permission, a professor said twenty interviews would
not, but three hundred would.[174]

CAPMAS often denies or indefinitely delays permission to
research controversial topics. "You wait and the answer might not come at all,
or it may come after a couple months," the AUC sociologist said.[175] If a
negative reply does come, CAPMAS does not provide justifications.[176]
Receiving a permit "depends on contacts and the sensitivity of topics. Certain
topics can't be researched," researcher Saad said.[177]
Although some criticism of the government is allowed, permission to research
contemporary politics is particularly difficult to obtain. For example, CAPMAS
might rubberstamp a request to survey public opinions about seatbelts while
rejecting a project about people's satisfaction with the government.[178] The
permit system targets the social sciences, which do field research on
contemporary issues, more than the humanities, which depend on libraries where
censors have control. Scholars wishing to use the largely state-run historical
archives also need permits, which are more available for projects on
pre-twentieth-century topics.[179]

CAPMAS must approve not only the subject of the project, but
also the specific questions asked of interviewees.[180]
It rejects some questions and asks others to be rewritten.[181]
If it does grant a permit, it requires researchers to provide updates of their
findings, monitoring progress to make sure nothing controversial has surfaced.[182] Some
academics consider the permit system merely a bureaucratic obstacle while
others call it a form of censorship. Either way such government regulations
block access to information, slow production of scholarship, and discourage
research into areas of social significance.

Researchers work around or try to avoid the state
restrictions. AUC professor and researcher Saadeddin Ibrahim said that he
usually applied for permits but started his research while he waited. If he got
caught, he explained that he was doing a pilot survey of a small sample. "I was
caught two or three times and said I was doing pre-testing. Many times it
worked," he said.[183]

Other people bypass the permit process altogether. "If
you're independent or a student, you risk it," Saad said.[184]
While a master's student, she applied for a permit but gave up and finally went
without. As a part of a research center, however, she no longer has that
freedom.[185] One
university sociologist said that he has never applied. "If you apply to do work
. . . then they know what the applicant intends to do. I don't want to give
them information. I will be singled out, potentially face academic trouble.
They might watch me more or tap my phone." Instead he does work without a
permit and tries to limit himself to small-scale projects. "It seems like more
and more people don't apply to do research," the sociologist said.[186] They
either try working without a permit or change their topics.

For those who choose the former route, scholarship presents
personal risks. Saadeddin Ibrahim was imprisoned and endured a multiyear court
battle; although not officially charged with researching without a permit, he
believes he was targeted for his failure to follow procedure. "The guerrilla
technique caught up with me in the end," Ibrahim said.[187]
He was arrested two or three weeks after the army realized he had not received
a CAPMAS permit for a project on public trust in institutions, including the
army. "Even though the army received an eighty percent rating, one of the top
institutions, they didn't approve of my doing it without a permit," he said.[188] Lower
profile work can also attract unwanted police attention. A few years ago, two
AUC students interviewed passersby in Tahrir
Square, the main square in Cairo, for a school project. Security forces
took them to the police station and interrogated them. They were later released
unharmed.[189]

The risks involved with doing controversial research
"illegally" can compromise the quality of scholarship. "There is good quality
work in pockets, but it's disconnected," Saad said.[190]
Large surveys are difficult because they require people to deliver thousands of
questionnaires.[191] To avoid
needing a permit or to escape detection, researchers instead tend to rely on
smaller samples. Foreign researchers often bypass the process. "Somehow they
manage. How properly is another question," the sociologist said. "They do
guerrilla-type research-ask and run."[192]
While this approach allows academics to bring attention to the issues they care
about, their conclusions are less reliable because they are based on less
in-depth research.

Trial and Imprisonment: Saadeddin Ibrahim Case Study

When research topics cross too many red lines, the Egyptian
government responds by shutting down research centers and imprisoning their
scholars. The case of Saadeddin Ibrahim, which attracted international
attention, exemplifies this situation.[193]
An AUC professor, Ibrahim was targeted for his work as director of the Ibn
Khaldun Center for Development Studies, a research institute focusing on issues
of democratization and the role of civil society. (Many Egyptian academics do
their scholarship through independent or university-affiliated research
centers.) While the case was unusual, it illustrates the extremes the state
will go to stifle research and discourage work on controversial topics.

On the night of June 30, 2000, State Security Intelligence officials
raided Ibrahim's home and the offices of the Ibn Khaldun Center. They detained
the professor and two colleagues and interrogated them without lawyers for
several hours. The next day Ibrahim and Nadia `Abd al-Nur were placed in
preventive detention, which the state can renew every fifteen days under the
Emergency Law. The state also shut down the Ibn Khaldun Center, which stayed
closed for three years.[194] Ibrahim
was released on bail on August 10, and other Ibn Khaldun colleagues who had
been detained were released the following week. Ibrahim, however, refused to
yield to state pressure and announced that the center would pursue its plans to
monitor elections. As a result, on September 24, the Supreme State Security
Prosecution indicted Ibrahim and twenty-seven coworkers.

The state brought charges against Ibrahim on four counts
related to his work at the research center. First, it alleged he planned to
bribe officials of the national Broadcasting and TelevisionCenter
to obtain more media coverage for his work, which would help him receive more
funding. Second, it charged Ibrahim with receiving donations, in this case from
the European Union, without prior permission from competent authorities. The
military order that this charge was based on requires that an individual obtain
permission before receiving certain kinds of foreign funding.[195] Third,
the prosecution claimed the professor deliberately disseminated false
information abroad about the internal situation in Egypt and thereby undermined the
stature of the state. In particular, the prosecution accused Ibrahim of saying
that Egypt
has religious discrimination and rigged elections. Finally, it charged him with
using deceptive means to profit personally from European Union funds made
available to the Ibn Khaldun Center. The court convicted Ibrahim on all but the
first charge.

Ibrahim's treatment before and during trial was fraught with
irregularities and failed to meet international standards for a fair trial. He
and his colleagues were detained for up to six weeks before being formally
charged. Some of the defendants were arrested without warrants, and prosecution
officials interrogated them without counsel present. During the trial, the
defense counsel had inadequate time to prepare and inadequate access to
documents. The presiding judge failed to consider many of the defense's key
arguments and announced the sentence after the tribunal had taken less than two
hours to deliberate.

The trial not only halted Ibrahim's research but also put
him through a multiyear ordeal, which included significant prison time. The
court sentenced Ibrahim and his colleagues on May 21, 2001. Ibrahim received seven years in
prison and his colleagues sentences ranging from one year suspended to five
years of imprisonment with labor. The Court of Cassation heard Ibrahim's
initial appeal in December 2001, and this hearing eventually led to a retrial.
On July 29, 2002, the State Security court handed down a new seven-year
sentence to Ibrahim; it ignored his pleas to suspend the proceedings while he
traveled abroad to receive treatment for a degenerative neurological condition
that had worsened during his incarceration. The court reduced sentences for a
few of his colleagues but for the most part they remained unchanged.[196] In
December 2002, on a second appeal, the Court of Cassation overturned the
verdict and released Ibrahim although he was still prohibited from traveling
abroad.[197] The high
court finally acquitted Ibrahim and his associations in March 2003 after
reviewing the case on its merits for the first time.[198]

While Ibrahim's trials dealt with the prosecution's four
charges against him, observers and the defendant himself believe the state
really arrested him to stop his research on controversial topics. According to
a July 2000 letter from the Middle East Studies Association's (MESA's) Committee on
Academic Freedom, "The charges on which Dr. Ibrahim and his colleagues are
being investigated appear to have been brought in order to prevent them from
exercising their basic right to freedom of expression and freedom of
association."[199] Ibrahim
was charged the day after he announced plans to monitor elections. He was also
researching industries that wanted to enter the American market with regard to
social issues, like gender equality, child labor, and environmental protection.
"In the end, they got me on research testing," Ibrahim told Human Rights Watch.[200]
Irfan Siddiq, press officer at the U.K. Embassy, listed three red lines in Egypt,
including political democratization and reform, personal criticism of the
regime, and inter-religious conflict. "Saadeddin Ibrahim did all three. He
monitored elections, and [discussed] the president's son and serial succession.
The center did research on Coptic discrimination."[201]
While the targeting of Ibrahim seemed to surprise few Egyptian observers,
including the defendant, the case shows the extremes the state will go to to
shut down research. Although Ibrahim knew the danger he faced by crossing red
lines, those lines constitute unacceptable restrictions on academic freedom.

Conclusion and Recommendations

The Egyptian government violates academics' freedom of
expression by restricting scholarly research. It particularly infringes on the
freedom to "seek, receive and impart information and ideas." The state may
legitimately limit research on certain topics under Article 19(3). For example,
national security may justify keeping some documents classified. Human Rights Watch found, however, that CAPMAS seems
to have a much broader sweep than necessary and, in some cases, indefinitely
delays rather than formally rejects topics, thus failing to provide
restrictions by law. By interfering with research subjects and methods, the
system has contributed to the stagnant nature of contemporary scholarship.

The state has committed other abuses in its efforts to
punish especially controversial academic inquiries. In the Ibrahim case, for
example, it used arbitrary arrest and unfair trials to squelch research it
considered objectionable. Such tactics not only violate academic freedom but
also represent unacceptable abuses of human rights.

Human Rights Watch
recommends:

An
end to the CAPMAS permit requirements.

An
end to the misuse of other laws, such as foreign funding laws, to stifle
academics who research controversial topics.

Controls on Student Activities

Students in Egypt
face considerable limitations on their activities outside of the classroom.
Extracurricular activities provide students an opportunity to apply the
knowledge and ideasthey have
acquired elsewhere in their education. They prepare students to be active and
responsible citizens by learning to govern themselves and work together for a
common end. In Egypt,
however, government-appointed deans and state security forces have
systematically shut down many forms of substantive expression in campus
activities. The state has disempowered student unions and clubs and interfered
with other traditional outlets for student opinion. Such repression not only
stifles political activism but also deprives students of valuable forums for
learning from each other and preparing for adulthood.

Student Groups and Demands

Most Egyptian university students avoid involvement in
campus or national politics. A small minority, however, takes a more activist
stance and generally falls into one of two broad categories: leftist or
Islamist. The former include the Nasserists (Arab nationalists), socialists,
and communists, who pursue a secular agenda. Islamists, by far the larger group
currently, seek to make Egypt
an Islamic society based on a conservative interpretation of Shari'a law. Their
ranks include the moderate Muslim Brothers and more violent fringes, such as al-Gama`a al-Islamiyya (Islamic Group)
and al-Gihad (Holy War, known abroad
as Egyptian Islamic Jihad).

Although they differ on politics and tactics, the leftist
and Islamist students share many concerns and face similar restrictions from
the state. Politically they oppose the government's normalization of relations
with Israel and more
recently the U.S./U.K. presence in Iraq. Students on both sides also
shared with Human Rights Watch
similar complaints about life at the national universities, for example, the
rigidity of the educational system, the price of textbooks, and living
conditions at the university hostel. Government authorities, fearing the
disruptive potential of the leftists' public protests and the Islamists'
growing strength, have suppressed any student activities that might challenge
the status quo.

Student Unions

Egyptian authorities take extreme measures to repress
student unions. Students in each faculty elect a union of about eleven members,
and members of a university-wide union are chosen from these bodies. Delegates
from each university union represent their institution at the national Egyptian
Student Union. The unions organize cultural, athletic, and social events and
serve as liaisons between the students and the university faculty and staff.[202] In the
latter role, student unions should provide a valuable means for students to
voice their concerns, but state security forces and state-appointed
administrators have deprived them of any influence.

The law governing state universities describes a student
union that facilitates expression. The first aim of the body is: "Developing
the spiritual and moral values, and national consciousness among the students,
training them in command traits, and providing the chance for them to express their
views."[203] The
reality, however, is quite different. The University Law of 1979, which
replaced a more liberal statute from 1976, stripped the student unions of
power. Among other stipulations, the 1979 law includes a clause requiring
nominees to "enjoy good and straight conduct and good reputation."[204] The
state-appointed administration has used this vague requirement to screen out
both leftist and Islamist applicants. Through this and other provisions, the
government has turned student unions into an arm of the state.

The state uses several means to neutralize the political
power of student unions. In a number of cases, university officials and
security forces have directly intimidated students in an attempt to prevent
them from nominating themselves. In many others, administrators have used the
law's "good conduct" clause to weed out the most controversial applicants. Some
students have challenged their rejection in administrative court and won, but
long after the elections, at a time when the term of office had nearly ended.
On some occasions, the administration has resorted to interfering with the
voting process, thereby affecting election results. According to one student,
security forces sometimes detain nominees in the university hostel until the election
is over.[205] As noted
below, administrators have also held elections on school holidays or used the
police to keep Islamists off campus so they could not vote. Such practices give
the state control of election results. If a quorum of fifty percent does not
cast ballots, the election has to be redone. A second election requires a
quorum of twenty percent. If voter turnout is still too low, the administration
appoints the winners, giving it carte blanche to select students who meet its
political criteria.[206] Several
students recounted to Human Rights Watch
the obstacles they faced when trying to run for student union, and their
stories are told below.

The administration has pressured some students to withdraw
their names from the ballot through verbal discouragement or intimidation.
Socialist Yasir Dahmash first nominated himself for the student union elections
at CairoUniversity's Faculty of Political
Science as a second-year student in fall 1999. The administration told him he
should not run because he was not going to win. He withdrew his name one week
before the election and decided to wait for a time when he could run on a slate
with others. The next year, rural-born Dahmash joined candidates from the
Egyptian countryside who felt they had been discriminated against by their
urban classmates. "We wanted to improve conditions for those from outside Cairo," Dahmash said.[207] Their
opponents, who had connections with the university administration and security
forces, told them they had no chance of winning and threatened to tell the
security forces they were politically active. "The intimidation really worked,"
Dahmash said. "We preferred to withdraw instead of fighting a losing battle."[208] In his
fourth and final year, 2001, Dahmash again nominated himself as part of the
rural students' slate, which included leftists and Islamists staying in the
university hostel. At the administration's urging, the two slates cancelled the
election and split the union. In Dahmash's view, "It was an injustice because
if we had run in a fair election, our chances of victory were better."[209]

The administration has used the University Law of 1979 to
disqualify other students. Tamir Sulaiman Ibrahim, a 2002 graduate of CairoUniversity,
nominated himself for the Faculty of Law's union during the 1994-1995 school
year. He had proven leadership abilities, having organized a student club and
represented his faculty at chess competitions. The administration disqualified
him, however, for "poor conduct." It had suspended him previously for leftist
political activity.[210]
Ibrahim's friend `Imad Mubarak, a socialist who graduated from `Ain Shams in
2000, described the 1979 law as "illegal and a farce." He said he believes
students should boycott the union as an illegitimate organization.[211]

In other cases, the administration creates bureaucratic
obstacles to running for student union. Mahmud, a Muslim Brother and 2002
graduate of Dar al-`Ulum, faced unanticipated hurdles when he nominated himself
for election. Just a day before the election, the administration announced
additional requirements, such as the provision of multiple photos and signed,
photocopied, and stamped proof of student activities. While his opponents, as
they later admitted, had been privately informed of the new requirements and had
been able to prepare their papers in advance, the administration tried to deter
Muslim Brothers with the extra work. "On the outside the general procedures
were for all students, but papers [of non-Islamists] were ready in advance.
Some of the students admitted this," Mahmud said.[212]

Some students, especially Islamists, have challenged their
disqualifications in court. Samer, a 2002 graduate of CairoUniversity
and a Muslim Brother, tried to nominate himself his first year, but the
administration denied him and about thirty other Islamists. Samer told Human Rights Watch that five or six of them
challenged the decision in court and won. In new court-ordered elections, some
of the initially denied students received eighty percent or more of the vote.
Others lost, but in a fair election. Although Samer won a post as secretary of
the social committee, he found he faced unfair obstacles to organizing events.
"The restrictions make it impossible to perform activities," he said.[213] The next
year, the administration again kept him and other Islamists off the ballot, and
the students again appealed to the court. This time, however, the university
filed a separate administrative procedure that delayed the judgment by three
months. Although Samer ultimately prevailed in his case, it was too late to
have a new election in April. In October 1999, with the support of a new dean,
Samer was elected secretary with more than ninety percent of the vote.[214] While
the courts should be commended for giving students a fair hearing, the students
should not have had to turn to the legal system to resolve an internal
university matter.

Efforts to control the outcome of student union elections
escalate as the process advances, and only the most determined activists remain
engaged. Fourth-year student Muhammad Faruq said students from the
pro-government club Horus throw stones at Islamist voters, and the dean in his
faculty sometimes schedules elections for a school holiday when fewer people
will be on campus.[215]

In extreme cases, activist students have been arrested and
tortured. In October 2001, the administration told the security forces at Dar
al-`Ulum to form a human wall to keep out Islamists. Mahmud, an Islamist
student, complained and two days later he was arrested, blindfolded, and tortured
for two days. Mahmud told Human Rights Watch
that police denied him food and water and used a variety of torture techniques
including hanging him from his wrists while beating him, inserting a steel rod
up his anus, and electrocuting "sensitive areas." The long-term psychological
damage interfered with his studies, hurting his grades and leaving him without
a job after graduation.[216]
Documents provided by Mahmud's lawyer show that this incident was not his first
run in with the state. The university had previously punished him for
vandalizing notices, yelling at a professor in the classroom, and holding the
student activities office hostage in order to obtain the names of candidates
running for student union.[217]

The physical and psychological dangers of involvement do not
end once a student becomes a member of the student union. In January 2000,
three months after Samer was elected to his faculty's union, he and about
twenty others were arrested and spent four months in detention. The police
falsely accused him of meeting with people whom he barely knew to plan illegal
activities. During a thirty-six hour period, they blindfolded him, forbade
moving or talking, and fed him only one meal. Although Samer was ultimately
released, he continues to receive threatening calls from the security service
and his case remains open.[218]

Some students express satisfaction with student unions.
Rasha Daisty served as assistant head of the student union for CairoUniversity's
Faculty of Economics and Political Sciences in 2002-2003. She said the union
transmits student views to the head of the faculty and helps organize seminars,
conferences, and parties. "It feels like we have enough opportunity to express
our opinion," she said. "In the Political Science Department we try to be
neutral, to study but not practice politics."[219]
Daisty said she feels free to criticize the government or its economic policy.
"Others fear [for] nothing. They won't be arrested. It's in their imagination,"
she said.[220]Human Rights Watch, however, found that students do
have reason to fear harassment and arrest.

Minister of Higher Education Shehab defended both the
current state of the unions and the restrictions of the 1979 law. He said Sadat
amended the more liberal 1976 law because student representatives had abused
their financial power. He argued that the change did not adversely affect the
union because under today's rules, "on paper, anyone has the right to be a
candidate."[221] The only
restrictions, according to the minister, are that students must have experience
appropriate to the committees on which they serve. For example, the chairperson
of the sports committee should be an athlete. The minister expressed regret
that elections often become appointments because not enough students vote.[222] He did
not mention, however, university officials' misuse of the good conduct clause
or how the frequent lack of a quorum in effect allows state-appointed deans to
pick students who do not threaten the status quo.

Student Clubs, or Usar

The main centers for student activity in Egypt are student clubs called usar (singular usra), or families. These clubs serve as social centers and forums
for intellectual exchange. Like student unions, however, usar are restricted by the state. The law requires clubs to have
approval from the university administration, which often bases its decisions on
politics.

The administration frequently denies students permission to
create groups and regulates the activities of those that are created. To form
an usra, students need a professor
supervisor, at least twenty members with student identification cards, and a
memorandum about what activities they hope to do. The University Law states,
"No organizations or formations shall be established on category, political, or
creed basis in the Universities or its units."[223]CairoUniversity student Bassam Murtada said,
"The administration looks with an eye of doubt on anything to do with politics.
. . . You end up with usar that do
trips."[224] Dahmash,
a 2002 graduate of Cairo University and current master's student, said some
proposed usar are turned down for
"weird reasons." A fellow student submitted papers, with the support of a
prominent professor, to examine the issue of unemployment and how students can
find better work opportunities. Although the student insisted he was
apolitical, the administration accused him of being a communist and said
communists are not allowed to have usar.[225] Islamist
students also feel the limitations on usar.
"If it [addresses] a serious topic, not even a political [one], such as
bringing personalities to talk at a conference, it can lead to abolition of an usra," said Muhammad Faruq, a
fourth-year student at CairoUniversity.[226] If a
group does something political, its supervisor often abandons it and the
administration dissolves it.

Administrative restrictions affect faculty members as well.
Some professors fear involvement with usar.
A Dar al-`Ulum professor said that they hesitate to supervise clubs and when
they do, they "put their fingers in each activity to make themselves look
pro-administration."[227] Others
are kept out by the administration. Sayyed el-Bahrawy, a well-known leftist
professor, used to serve as a club supervisor. In recent years, however, the
university banned him from that role as a result of his leftist politics. "I am
prevented from any relation with students except inside the classroom," he
said.[228] As the
only full professor of Arabic literature at CairoUniversity,
he said, he should supervise all literary activities but is never invited. In
addition to blocking valuable interaction between professor and student, this
ruling has affected el-Bahrawy's salary. Professors who supervise usar receive extra pay.[229]

Other Forms of Student Expression

The police and state-appointed administration also block exhibitions,
posters, campus publications, and verbal appeals. Usar produce some of these media, but others are more individual
and impromptu. In addition to the usual red lines, opposition to normalization
with Israel
and criticism of Israeli treatment of the Palestinians are among the most
controversial subjects. The university sees such forms of student expression as
threats to be stifled instead of important means of stimulating debate.

Security forces monitor student exhibitions, one of the most
popular types of expression on campus. Minister of Higher Education Shehab
said, "Students have a right to make exhibitions as long as they are not
against morals or [do not] include impolite words about the president."[230] If the
subject is controversial, however, representatives of the state step in.
Security forces destroy the students' exhibitions and sometimes even beat the
creators, who stand nearby to answer questions. They often follow students who
try to hide and then confiscate their work. "No matter how many students guard
it, if they want to tear it, they will," Murtada said.[231]
Repression of exhibitions extends to observers. Pro-government Horus students
tell onlookers to move on, calling the exhibition designers troublemakers or
infidels. Security forces take members of the crowd to the university guard's
office to intimidate others from gathering to look.[232]
While at an exhibition about Palestine,
Yasir Dahmash said, he heard an apolitical friend receive a call on his mobile
phone. The caller asked after him and his group of friends by name. "Beware of
your actions," the voice continued. "So far you are not classified [as a
troublemaker]. I'm talking to you like a brother." The group later traced the
caller's number to the state security forces station in Giza.[233]

To hang posters called "wallpapers," another form of
protest, students must pass the university guards and obtain the
administration's permission, which is not granted if there is controversial
content. Students said the guards regularly confiscate posters they consider
inappropriate. According to Mustafa, students at `Ain Shams hide posters in
their bags and jump over the campus fence.[234]
Recent Cairo
graduate Tamir Sulaiman Ibrahim made
a wallpaper about the Arab-Israeli conflict that included text and an image of
a skeleton with burnt edges. The university guards told him he could not bring
the poster on campus, even when he explained he was seeking permission to hang
it. He then smuggled it on campus. When the administration denied approval,
Ibrahim hung it anyway and stood next to it in defiance. The administration
suspended him for about two weeks for what it described as "an exhibition in
solidarity with the Lebanese people."[235]
It cited incidents like this one in ruling him ineligible to run for student
union.[236]

Distributing pamphlets or student newspapers also poses
dangers. Iman Kamil and her socialist colleagues formed a magazine called The Step. They kept it running for four
years, but at their own expense and at personal risk. "The security forces took
and beat the students distributing it to their office and detained them for a
number of hours," Kamil said.[237] After
handing out flyers on campus in 1998, she, too, was detained at the university
guard's office for three to four hours. Other students surrounded the office
and demanded her release, which was finally granted.[238]

Police respond to oral expression with even more
intolerance. The most common means of verbal protest is for students to stand
at the podium in their lecture halls before class starts. They may talk about a
certain issue or announce an event, such as a demonstration. "It is very hard
to do this. It is met with a severe kind of punishment. They are [physically]
hit very hard," Murtada said.[239] Several
students said they had witnessed police drag classmates away from the podium.[240] Tamir
Sulaiman Ibrahim, for example, used a microphone to address his peers before a
lecture started. When police tried to arrest him, a fight broke out between his
friends and the police and their supporters. His faculty punished him by
prohibiting him from taking his exams that term.[241]

Even if students receive approval for some form of
expression, the administration can withdraw it at a moment's notice. Dahmash,
the rural student who had run for student union, helped organize a three-day
event about Palestine
in April 2002 with the dean's permission. The event went smoothly until
Islamist students in his faculty wrote a public letter thanking the dean for
his support. The dean was furious to be publicly associated with the religious
group. Dahmash suggested the organizers publish a letter explaining they were
not affiliated with Islamists, but the dean ordered the event shut down.[242]

AUC students are generally considered less political than
those in the national system, but they, too, face restrictions on expression.[243] One
student explained that "everything has to be approved by an academic adviser
and the office of student activities."[244]
Posters, for example, require the stamp of the office of student activities. She
argued that this violates the American model of liberal education that the
institution is trying to follow.[245]
This university is a private institution so its restrictions are not directly
attributable to state action. Nevertheless, state practices at the national
universities encourage restrictions on free speech at AUC.

Conclusion and Recommendations

The Egyptian government, through its security forces and
university administration, systematically denies academic freedom to its
students. First it interferes with students' freedom of association. Although
the state can restrict associations to protect national security, public safety
and order, public health and morals, and others' rights, its interference with
the usar cannot be justified on any
of these grounds. The treatment of student unions also raises freedom of
association concerns. The state has clearly violated students' right to
participate freely and the unions' right to act on behalf of its members.[246]

The state has routinely stifled students' academic freedom
in other ways as well. Its suppression of student exhibitions, wallpapers,
publications, and speeches that address serious matters rarely, if ever, fits
one of the narrowly defined conditions under which limits on freedom of
expression may be justified. Restrictions imposed on students also violate
other internationally recognized human rights. Egypt
has arbitrarily arrested students, illegally detained them without charge, and
tortured them, all acts prohibited under international law treaties to which Egypt
is a party.

Human Rights Watch recommends:

Police
intimidation and physical abuse of students cease immediately.

The
University Law of 1979 be amended to allow the formation of political and
religious clubs and to remove the "good conduct" requirement for student
union nominees.

The
administration and security forces allow free student expression in the
form of exhibitions, wallpapers, publications, and verbal appeals. Such
speech should not be restricted except for the narrow exceptions allowed
under international law.

Far-Reaching Limits on Campus Demonstrations

The Egyptian government keeps an equally tight rein on
campus demonstrations, historically an important locus of political expression
in society. These gatherings, where professors and students come together, can
stimulate intellectual exchange on social and political topics of the day. They
also provide a means to challenge existing knowledge and ideasand attract public attention to shared
views. They are particularly important in Egypt because campuses are exempted
from nationwide limits on public assemblies.[247]
While state laws do allow demonstrations at universities, authorities use
several methods to restrict their impact.

First, university guards control access. The guards try to
confine demonstrations to university grounds, which limits their effect since
the public cannot see them. Second, during protests the security forces often
use violence against participants or detain them arbitrarily. Finally, the
state retaliates against student demonstrators after the fact. The following
case studies illustrate these techniques of government control and document
academic freedom abuses at high-profile demonstrations.

Violence on Campus: Alexandria University 2002

State security forces killed a student with live ammunition
during a demonstration at AlexandriaUniversity on April 9, 2002. Using tear
gas, rubber bullets, and batons, they partly blinded four others and wounded
additional 118.[248] The
violence injured bystanders as well as participants and caused even the most
activist students to reconsider and in some cases retreat from their
activities.

Students had gathered that morning to protest a visit by
U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell. The dean of the Faculty of Medicine told
the crowd that the administration would allow a peaceful demonstration that did
not damage property. He proposed that the students disband and form a small
delegation to take a letter to Powell at the AmericanCulturalCenter. After half an
hour, the dean disappeared. "It was obviously an attempt just to disband [the
students]," a student witness said.[249]
The guards had left one gate open opposite the Faculty of Law, implying that
they would allow demonstrators to leave campus. When the students started to go
out the gate, however, they collided with police and the "usual chaos" ensued.[250]

The peaceful demonstration and police response quickly
escalated to violence. Although the sequence of events is in dispute, press
accounts report that students hurled stones at the police and those who escaped
campus burned cars.[251] Security
forces reportedly attacked the students with electric sticks and wooden batons
with iron spikes. Students grew more enraged when they saw their injured
classmates carried back onto campus. Since the police could not stop the crowd,
one group of officers formed a barrier in front of the gate while another
mounted high buildings outside the university from which it lobbed tear gas
onto campus grounds. The gas suffocated some protesters, and canisters hit
others on the head. The police also used a blue water that contains an
eye-stinging chemical. "The students were trapped. They tried to get outside
[to escape the gas] but others waited outside to hit them," a witness said.[252] The gas
was so thick that it reached professors' offices two or three stories up. A
university guard at the Faculty of Law was suffocating in his office when some
students broke down his door to rescue him. Then police started firing rubber
bullets into the crowd, which had swelled from five hundred demonstrators to
eight thousand students trying to escape the tumult. By the end of the day,
student Muhammad al-Saqa had been shot and killed by the police.[253]
According to the Ministry of the Interior, police killed him with shotgun fire
after protestors threw stones at their ranks.[254]

Of the four partly blinded students, at least two were mere
bystanders to the demonstration. They both said they were not politically
active. One was sitting by the Faculty of Law with his girlfriend. "Students
came running because of the tear bomb. We ran to the gate. There was black
smoke so we couldn't see they were firing these kinds of bullets." One bullet struck
him just next to his left eye.[255] The
other student had just returned from a vacation in Sharm al-Shaikh and did not
know what was going on. When he saw tear gas hit his classmates, he helped
carry a handicapped student to a mosque, "but they started bombing the mosque
[with tear gas canisters]." A rubber bullet penetrated his eye. The nearest
gate was locked so he had to walk around to the other side of the university
and to hail a cab to take him to the hospital.[256]

The shooting was just the beginning of a long ordeal for
four students who suffered eye damage. Although the severity of their injuries
saved them from detention in prison, they were handcuffed to their hospital
beds and denied access to visitors, including family members bringing them
food. Security forces interrogated them about their political affiliations and
state-owned television attacked them as troublemakers and traitors.[257] The day
after the event the government tried to place blame on the students by showing
videos of security forces injured or collapsed from exhaustion. "It was not
anymore students trying to express themselves. It was a battle where they show
the victims," said Bassam Murtada, a CairoUniversity student who
watched the coverage.[258]

The injuries of the four students required further medical
attention that was not available in Egypt. Having been denied visas by
the United Kingdom, they
traveled to Spain.
One defected to Italy, but
the other three had surgery and returned to Egypt. As of February 2003, the two
bystanders whom Human Rights Watch
interviewed were still blind in their injured eyes. They needed to return to Spain
for a subsequent surgery but the Egyptian government had not granted them the
necessary permission. The incident not only caused great physical and psychological
injury but also interfered with their education. Both students were in their
final year of study at the time of the demonstration. They missed exams in
spring 2002 and expected to lose another semester in spring 2003.[259]

International Politics: CairoUniversity
and AUC 2003

In spring 2003, at the time Human
Rights Watch conducted the initial research for this report,
campus demonstrations focused on the war in Iraq and the Israel/Palestine
conflict. Both leftists and Islamists organized rallies. While the pending war
led to an increase in protests, even Minister of Higher Education Shehab noted
that activists no longer spoke about domestic issues.[260]
The government contained the campus demonstrations without using the extensive
violence of Alexandria,
in part because professors put themselves between the students and the police.
Authorities applied force more aggressively, however, once the gatherings
spilled into public spaces.

On February 22, 2003, leftist protestors gathered on the
steps of CairoUniversity's
main building, the domed Great Festival Hall, to oppose war in Iraq
and Israeli treatment of Palestinians.[261]
Professors had organized the demonstration to give students the opportunity to
express themselves. After speeches by professors and students, the faculty
members led the crowd on a march to the campus exit. Although the demonstration
was at CairoUniversity,
it attracted faculty and students from `Ain Shams, Alexandria, and AUC.The university guards tried to contain the
demonstration by closing the campus gates. Students quickly scaled the barriers
with banners. When the guards opened the gates ten minutes later, possibly
fearing negative press coverage, the campus demonstrators joined other anti-war
leftists in a small square just outside the university. The protest lasted for
more than four hours but a cordon of police officers with black riot gear,
shields, helmets, and bamboo sticks carefully confined it to the plaza. A water
cannon stood ready nearby. When students sought to push through the cordon
after several hours, police started beating some of them. Knowing that security
forces rarely attack professors, faculty members formed a human chain between
the riot shields and students to protect the latter from the police.

-

A man
holding a professors' banner at a demonstration on February 22, 2003, confronts state
security forces.Leftist professors
organized the protest at CairoUniversity in which
students also took part.

2003
Bonnie Docherty / Human Rights Watch

By all accounts, the police reaction was mild when compared
with previous treatment of protestors. "The security forces were given orders
not to harass demonstrators. It was very obvious. . . . A soldier couldn't
understand why his officer was stopping him. [He seemed to be thinking] 'You
used to give us orders to hit,'" said a CairoUniversity
lecturer who attended.[262]
Nevertheless, a few students suffered injuries. The police punched one named
Wa'il in the eye, and `Ain Shams professor Aida
Seif El Dawla took him to the hospital.[263]
Security forces detained two other students, a man and woman.[264]

An Islamist protest four days later addressed the same
international issues in a more orderly form. This anti-war demonstration
consisted of an organized march around the campus and did not seek to leave
university grounds. Professors in suits led the four-hour march, followed by
male students with megaphones and banners. More quiet female students brought
up the rear. This protest was much larger than the leftist one, illustrating the
size of the Islamist movement. It also put a religious spin on the same
political issues. The leftists had been politically divided between Nasserists
calling for a pan-Arab nation and socialists and communists calling for
revolution. The religiously more united Islamists carried Qurans and signs that
read "Jihad is the answer."

While the largest anti-war rallies took place off campus,
members of the university community were inevitably involved. On March 20, 2003, the day the
U.S.-led war with Iraq
started, a demonstration that some observers said had begun at AUC swelled into
a protest of 10,000 people in Tahrir
Square, the largest there since 1972.[265] The
protest continued the next day, at which point the state responded violently.
Security forces arrested about eight hundred activists and injured hundreds
more, many of whom were professors or students.[266]
One student, for example, was detained for more than twelve hours and was
blindfolded and forced to stand for several hours. He heard police slap and electroshock
others.[267] On March
22, three female students were arrested while trying to enter CairoUniversity
to attend another antiwar demonstration. Police kicked Nurhan Thabit, a
pregnant CairoUniversity student, during her arrest
and while she was blindfolded and handcuffed in custody.[268]

University Issues: `AinShamsUniversity
1999

International politics have dominated protests in recent
years, but students have also staged demonstrations to challenge university
policies on issues relating to campus life. Activist students have frequently
rallied in support of peers suffering at the hands of the administration, such
as handicapped students denied access to their school or education students
denied job protection. While such demonstrations address internal university
affairs rather than international or national concerns, police repress them
with as much or more violence.

Islamist students march around the campus of CairoUniversity
during a protest on February 26, 2003.This demonstration, which stayed within university grounds, faced less
opposition from the state police than the one organized by leftist academics a
few days earlier. 2003 Bonnie Docherty
/ Human Rights Watch

In March 1999, students rallied at the Faculty of Education
at `Ain Shams to challenge a new education policy. The government had recently
issued a decree saying that it was no longer responsible for assigning
graduates teaching positions in secondary schools, overturning an earlier law
guaranteeing employment within two years. Education school

students feared unemployment. Socialist students at `Ain
Shams organized a peaceful demonstration to support their classmates. They
faced initial resistance from pro-government Horus students, who beat them, and
Islamists who are ideologically opposed to their socialist peers. Then,
according to participants, the security forces responded to student speeches by
hitting them with belts and steel-toed boots. Iman Kamil, a 2000 graduate of
the Faculty of Arts, described being hit by plainclothes security forces with
belts, fists, and sticks with iron spikes. The beatings fractured bones in her
friends' legs and chest and gave one student a nosebleed. "The guy who was
bleeding from his nose had a heart problem so he was scared he might be dying,"
she said.[269]

Kamil and classmate `Imad Mubarak from the Faculty of Law
were among a group of students arrested at the demonstration at 1 p.m. Mubarak
said he was kept in a bus until 4 p.m. and then interrogated by the state
security prosecutor until 3 or 4 a.m. Accused of distributing flyers that
incited students and of disturbing the peace, he spent a total of twenty-two
days in Tora prison.[270] Kamil
remembered that Yahya Salih of `Ain Shams's Department for Combat against
Communism, which is responsible for monitoring socialist students on campus,
came to humiliate them. "We were forced to sit on the tile floor. Most of the
officers in the department started swearing at us. 'Are you trying to change
things, to change the government? You're just kids. You're nothing.'"[271] The five
men and two women were separated and shared cells with ordinary criminals for
two days of their incarceration. "It was a weird experience to see criminals. I
thought those things existed only in movies. It was an eye-opening experience,"
Kamil said.[272] She was
particularly afraid for her safety, she said, because officers took one of her
cellmates, not a student, out at night. Upon her return, the cellmate said she
had been raped and beaten. The police kept Kamil in jail for weeks and
prevented her mother from visiting. She was finally released after about
twenty-five days.[273] These
particular students stayed involved in campus politics, but many less committed
ones would be deterred by such abusive treatment.

State repression of student protestors regularly accompanies
campus demonstrations in Egypt.
"Students have no right to speak about anything. They are non-existent,"
Murtada said. "Not only about participation in political issues but also issues
students suffer from inside, such as the price of books, number of students in
the classroom, harassment suffered at hands of guards at gates."[274] Students
and recent graduates described first-hand experiences with violence at other
protests, including: at `Ain Shams, one in support of handicapped students'
rights in 1996-1997; and at Cairo University, an antiwar and anti-Jewish
settlements demonstration in March 1997, a protest related to the Palestinian
uprising (intifadah) in September
2001, and an April 2002 demonstration in which students broke through the
university gates and marched to the nearby Israeli Embassy.[275]

Conclusion and Recommendations

The Egyptian government's response to campus demonstrations
has repeatedly violated the right to freedom of assembly. Article 21 of the
ICCPR protects peaceful demonstrations. The CESCR also states that academics
have the specific right "to express freely opinions about the institution or
system in which they work,"[276] which
they did in the protest at `Ain Shams in 1999. The other protests discussed
above addressed political issues but did not threaten national security.
International law allows security forces to maintain public order, but they
cannot respond to a peaceful demonstration with violence. Even if crowd control
is necessary, the use of arbitrary detention and excessive force is
illegitimate.

Human Rights Watch
recommends:

Professors
and students be allowed to protest peacefully on campus without state
interference or violence.

Demonstrators
not be detained under the Emergency Law for exercising their right to
freedom of assembly. If demonstrators are detained in a legitimate effort
to maintain public order, they should not be mistreated or kept without
charges for extended periods of time and they should be given access to
counsel and due process.

The
state allow public demonstrations outside of campuses to give all of its
citizens the freedom of assembly they are entitled to.

Government Victimization of Islamist Academics

The Egyptian government is notorious for using different
political groups against one another. In the 1970s, President Sadat empowered
the Islamists to counterbalance the leftist groups ascendant at the time. In
recent years, as the former have grown in influence, the state has sought to
repress Islamist academics. The human rights abuses described below affect to
some degree all government opposition groups, but Islamists often suffer more
than their fellow activists. Religiously oriented campus groups tend to have
larger memberships so they pose a potentially greater political threat to the
government. Given their size, the number of potential victims is also larger.
The government detains Islamists for longer periods and uses harsher
punishments.

As detailed at length in chapter six, the actions of some
Islamist militants have contributed to the climate of fear on Egypt's campuses and to the
imperiled state of academic freedom in the country today. Such behavior merits
strong condemnation and requires an effective response if Egyptian universities
are to regain their dynamism and influence. The intolerant or violent actions
of these Islamists, however, do not justify an across-the-board crackdown, let
alone the targeting of the peaceful Islamist expression and dissent described
below.

Harassment
and Detention

Egypt
subjects Islamists to regular harassment and detention. A majority of the
estimated 16,000 political prisoners in Egypt are Islamists.[277] While
all Islamists, especially professionals, are potential targets, students bear
the brunt of state repression.[278] Most of
the student union candidates who were jailed or tortured, for example, were
Islamists. The state also arbitrarily arrests Islamist professors and in 2004
fired thousands of secondary school teachers suspected of anti-government
sympathies.[279]

Fearing the rising political power of this religious
movement, the state often rounds up professionals, including professors, before
elections so that they cannot vote. "It's a seasonal thing. When there is an
election, hundreds [of Islamists] are arrested," said `Abd al-Mun`im `Abd
al-Maqsud, a lawyer for the Muslim Brotherhood.[280]
On November 6, 2001,
for example, nine Muslim Brother professors from seven universities were
arrested. Two were found innocent and released, but the rest received sentences
ranging from three to five years in prison. Charges, at least for alleged
Muslim Brothers, almost always include membership in an illegal organization
and possession of publications that promote the group's ideas. While the state
detains these professors more for their political opinions than their academic
activities, the arrests interfere with their teaching and spread fear on
campus.

The threat of detention makes the daily lives of Islamists
harder to endure. "It's not the repression in demonstrations. I suffer most from
the day-to-day bad things," CairoUniversity student Nadir
Muhammad said. "If I pray at the [campus] mosque, I feel I am watched. If we
try to gather money for the poor, someone tries to overhear us. I feel under
surveillance."[281] The
knowledge of what has happened to other Muslim Brothers haunts him even off
campus. "At home, when I hear someone banging on the door or ringing loudly, I
feel unsafe. I could be taken away at any time. If not for my faith, I would
have given up a long time ago."[282] Despite
the intimidation Muhammad said he is more frustrated and angry than afraid.
"What happens to colleagues is a direct insult on ourselves. We have to keep
the fight going on. I shouldn't feel frightened to express myself. They are
scared of us, of our strength and our belief."[283]
Although victimized, such Islamist students feel part of a larger movement that
is willing to challenge the state.

Academic Side Effects

Unlawful detention not only violates the basic human rights
of students and professors but also infringes on their academic freedom.
According to an Islamist lawyer, the most significant academic freedom problem
Islamists face is that the government prevents detained students from taking
exams. CairoUniversity, for example, denied student
union secretary Samer's request to take his exams in prison and then, when he
was released in time, refused to let him sit for the tests with his peers. As a
result, he had to repeat his third year of university.[284]
If students receive permission from the university, the Ministry of Interior is
supposed to allow the exams. "In eight years, I've never seen anyone take [an
exam in prison]," the lawyer said.[285]
Some students challenge this decision in the state council (administrative
court). The lawyer, who has tried several such cases, pushes for an expedited
decision, but it usually takes a year for the council to rule and by that time
the exam has passed, which means students being penalized in this manner have
to repeat the course. While in most cases the court rules in favor of the
student, the Ministry of Interior presents a serious obstacle to justice. "Even
if the court says yes, the person implementing [the decision] is [from] the
Ministry of Interior and just ignores it," he said.[286]
One of Samer's classmates, also a former member of the student union, said the
state detained him from January to April 2000. This student's jailers refused
to enforce the court's ruling that he should take exams. He had to repeat a
year of school and could not nominate himself for student union again.[287] On the
rare occasion that the ministry succumbs to outside pressure, the university
often refuses to administer the exam on the grounds that the student has missed
too many classes.[288]

Arrests can haunt academics for years after they are released.
Police confiscated the computer of a professor, who asked to remain anonymous,
when they arrested him. The state never returned the machine, and as a result,
he lost all of his research. "There are a lot of nasty things being done. One
accepts them as commonplace for a third-world country, but they are
unacceptable elsewhere," he said.[289]
Speaking of ongoing harassment he has faced, he said, "It's a fact of life we
begin to accept. Compared to prison this is nothing."[290]
The fear of severe repression has led Islamist academics to accept more mundane
restrictions. The state also blacklists for academic appointment students who
have been detained because of their ideology. In general the top four graduates
of each faculty receive positions as teaching assistants. An Islamist student
from `Ain Shams, who asked that his name and faculty be withheld, explained
that three of the top four students in his class were accepted but he, the
fourth to qualify, was denied. The security forces had reviewed his application
and learned that he had been detained for three years as a teenager. He was
never convicted of a crime. Since the paperwork is normally returned without
incident, the university had told him to start working. He did so for three
months without pay until his application was rejected. The student had planned
to pursue a Ph.D. and has sued to get his position back.[291]
His lawyer said this case is not an isolated one.[292]

Conclusion and Recommendations

Government abuse of Islamist faculty and students violates
their basic human rights. As explained earlier, unlawful detention is illegal
under international law. The fear generated by the Egyptian security services
deprives these professors and students the freedom to teach or study, and they
often suffer academic punishments for political activity.

The state repression described above also represents
unlawful discrimination because it targets a group based on its political and
religious opinions. ICCPR Article 2 says the state must ensure rights "without
distinction of any kind, such as race, colour, sex, language, religion,
political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other
status."[293]Egypt's
government has systematically violated the academic freedom of its professors
and students of all political and religious persuasions. It has also, however,
particularly targeted Islamists for abuse.

Human Rights Watch
recommends:

The
Egyptian government cease singling out Islamist students and professors
for abuse, including unlawful detention, imprisonment, and academic
punishments for political opinions.

VI.Non-State
Attacks on Academic Freedom:The
Islamist Factor

Campus activist groups with religio-political beliefs are
currently the primary targets of government repression at Egyptian universities.
Members of such groups, however, also actively seek to restrict the rights of
professors and students whose politics differ from their own. An AUC professor
described the phenomenon as "privatized repression," and some academics said
they feel even more pressure from these parties than from the government.[294] Islamist
militants have intimidated academics in all four areas of university life: the
classroom, research, student activities, and campus protests. According to
Hilwan literature professor al-Sayyid al-Sirwi, "the atmosphere of terror [they
have created] has aborted intellectual life."[295]

Rise of Islamist Attacks

Conservative Islam gained a stronger foothold in Egyptian
society in the early 1990s in part because the Egyptian government supported a religious
agenda to counterbalance the secular, leftist groups then leading the
opposition against the state. Radical Islamists attracted the world's attention
with terrorist attacks like the 1997 shootings of tourists in Luxor by al-Gama`a
al-Islamiyya. The Egyptian government cracked down hard on this group, but
in the meantime, a grassroots Islamic movement gained strength.[296] Some
Islamists have since sought to impose their beliefs on others and have
successfully restricted academic freedom at the universities.

Over the past decade, Islamist militants have attacked the
lives and livelihoods of academics. When one asks Egyptians about the state of
academic freedom in their country, the first thing most mention is the case of
Nasr Hamid Abu Zaid. In 1993, CairoUniversity denied Abu
Zaid, an educator of twenty years, promotion to professor, following claims
that his scholarship on the Quran was blasphemous. Islamists then initiated a
nationwide campaign against him. Using hisba,
a principle of Islamic law that allows "legal action against a fellow Muslim to
defend the faith," they charged he was an apostate and a non-Muslim and
therefore could not be married to a Muslim woman. Several Islamist lawyers
filed suit to force Abu Zaid to divorce his wife against the will of both.[297] The
lower court, following civil law, ruled the plaintiffs had no standing to bring
a complaint, but the appellate court overturned the decision, finding for the
Islamists and declaring his marriage dissolved. Abu Zaid and his wife fled to
the Netherlands
where they live today.[298] Islamist
militants thus used the state's machinery to drive an academic away from his
career and his country.

Outside the universities, intellectuals have faced physical
violence. In 1994 Islamist attackers stabbed Nobel laureate Naguib Mahfouz in
front of his home, claiming his novel Children
of the Alley was offensive to Islam.[299]In June 1992, Islamists murdered
columnist and public intellectual Farag Foda in the streets of Cairo. Al-Azhar had
condemned his writings as blasphemous; its Shaikh Muhammad al-Ghazali had
declared Foda an apostate and said that Islamic law would condone his killing. Al-Gama`a al-Islamiyya accepted
responsibility for the murder, saying "al-Azhar issued the sentence and we
carried out the execution."[300]

Recent attacks on academia have relied more on written and
verbal harassment. "The private pressure is largely from Islamists," an AUC
professor said. "It's at the society level not the university level. . . . If
you are producing a book, particularly an interpretation of Islam, you get
newspaper, especially Islamist, attacks."[301]
In April 2000, for example, the Islamist newspaper al-Sh`ab initiated a campaign against the Ministry of Culture's
reprinting of Haidar Haidar's A Banquet
for Seaweed in a series of renowned Arab novels. The article, and later
al-Azhar's Islamic Research Council (IRC), claimed the book was blasphemous,
had been published without the IRC's approval as required by law, and should be
banned. On May 8, thousands of students from al-Azhar rioted to protest the
novel. The police suppressed the demonstration, but the cultural ministry
eventually withdrew the book from print.[302]

Government complicity with intimidation by Islamist
militants has increased their power. State statutes provide legal mechanisms
that legitimize attacks by private individuals on academic freedom. Islamists
used hisba, for example, to drive Abu
Zaid out of the country. The law was later amended so that only the public
prosecutor can bring charges in domestic cases, but it remains on the books and
Islamists can be expected to pressure the prosecutor to use it.[303]
Censorship laws embolden Islamists to challenge course books, especially at
AUC. In other cases, government-appointed deans and university professors have
conceded to Islamists' demands, either out of fear or sympathy. For example,
university administrations regularly reject research topics considered
potentially offensive. According to one journalist, "The university takes the
side of extremist views at the cost of academic freedom because it doesn't want
political tension."[304] Whatever
the reason, the state's failure to protect academic freedom from non-state
actors adds to the lengthy list of violations discussed in the previous
chapter.

Classroom

Pressure from Islamist militants supplements government
censorship in the classrooms of national and private universities. "In the past
the enemy was the state. . . . Our problem now is society itself and the
mentality of people," HilwanUniversity's al-Sayyid
al-Sirwi said.[305] AUC
academics described the same phenomenon. "Students themselves are the censoring
body," said Arabic literature professor Samia Mehrez.[306]
According to a theater professor at AUC, most of the students in his history of
theater class favor censorship. His students have told him, "If you allow
freedom of expression, the communists will take over, women will be raped in
the streets, terrible things will happen. There will be no morality. Everything
will be permitted."[307] Islamist
and conservative students, along with their parents and the press, have
publicly challenged the choice of course books and thus altered university
curricula.

A pair of incidents
at AUC in the late 1990s brought the student censorship issue to a head and
attracted international attention. In May 1998, Didier Monciaud, an instructor
from France,
used Maxime Rodinson's biography Muhammad
in one of his classes. Parents of AUC students complained to an al-Ahram journalist that the book
violated Muslim beliefs. The uproar led to an order from President Mubarak to
remove the volume from the AUC library and to cease assigning it to classes.
"The AUC president immediately exercised the order and publicly apologized on
the front page of al-Ahram, [the
national newspaper]," AUC professor Samia Mehrez said.[308] She added that she rejects the parents'
interpretation of the book and notes that state libraries had included it in
their collections since its publication in the 1960s. Nevertheless, pressure
from religious militants pushed the university not to renew Monciaud's contract
despite support from his colleagues.[309]

Seven months later,
Islamists directed their attacks at Mehrez in a separate censorship scandal.
The secretary to the AUC president summoned her from a lecture she was giving
to a meeting with the university president, the dean of the faculty, the
university provost, and an AUC physician. On behalf of some Islamist and
conservative parents, the doctor had lodged a complaint against her assignment
of Mohamed Choukri's autobiographical
novel For Bread Alone in her Modern
Arabic Literature class. The book includes some homoerotic scenes from the
author's adolescence. "[The doctor] told the other three that if they couldn't
subdue me, the parents threatened another scandal in the press. They had
learned [from the Monciaud case]," Mehrez said in an interview with Human Rights Watch.[310] The parents claimed the book's references to
sex were offensive to Islamic traditions. In an unsigned letter to the AUC
administration, they wrote, "This story is far from the principles of Arabic
literature, he is talking about his dirty life that is of no interest to any
body [sic]. . . . [W]e believe that what has been written in some of the
chapters is enough to corrupt a whole generation."[311] The letter threatened a lawsuit and asked
AUC to "protect our children and the children of the Egyptian and Arab
Societies from such persons who are attacking the innocence of our new
generations. . . . [D]o not leave the teacher to control and destroy the minds
of our children."[312] Mehrez refused to apologize or remove the
book; others had taught it at AUC although they had used the English
translation, which generates less controversy than a work in Arabic. She agreed
not to require it for the final exam, but heard later the president had
promised on her behalf that she would not teach it again.[313]

The internal debate
that followed soon became a national and international one. Mehrez appealed to
her colleagues at AUC for support. "I thought naively I was in the academy and
that an academic issue would be resolved in the academy," she said.[314] The substance of the campus debate was
leaked to the parents and the press. "It became a national affair. There were
hundreds of articles and it went on for six months. Parliament asked for my
dismissal for ruining the minds of Egyptian youth," she said.[315] As is often the case in Egypt, the government abetted
efforts by Islamists to restrict academic freedom. When two colleagues from the
United States
publicized Mehrez's story on the Internet, however, she received international
support within forty-eight hours.[316] The AUC president told Minister of Higher
Education Shehab that he could not dismiss her because of this foreign support
and the potential for a lawsuit against the university. Six months later, the
commotion died down. Mehrez said she heard from a high government official that
President Mubarak himself ordered an end to the incident.[317] Mehrez first taught For Bread Alone again in May 2003 in a course on autobiography. She
reported that it "went very well" and that she plans to teach it again some
day. The Arabic version, however, remains banned.[318]

Islamist students
have also challenged books in the AUC library. In 2002, a student complained
she was offended by a book illustration of the Prophet Muhammad so the library
covered it.[319] El Sawy worries about publicizing the
existence of a reserve list of books banned for circulation because Islamist
students might start to challenge certain volumes; even though they do not
represent the government, such action could trigger stricter government
censorship.[320] El Sawy's concerns over AUC books
demonstrate how state repression and non-state intimidation work together to
restrict access to published material.

In 2004, Islamist
militants received new support from both al-Azhar and the state for their
efforts to ban books. In May 2004, al-Azhar's Islamic Research Council
recommended banning Nawal el-Saadawi's novel The Fall of the Imam, which had been on sale in Egypt since 1987.[321] On June 1, Minister of Justice Faruq Seif
al-Nasr gave clerics from al-Azhar authority to confiscate books and audio and
videotapes that they believe violate Islamic precepts.[322] "The move violates the freedom of speech,
belief and expression, all guaranteed in the Egyptian Constitution," said a
statement from the Egyptian Organization for Human Rights.[323] The minister's order led to the confiscation
of hundreds of publications from bookstores a few days later.[324] While these raids were not on university
grounds, they will likely affect the number of books available for use or sale
on campus.

While Islamists have primarily targeted course books,
professors at private and state universities said they also felt pressure from
them in other areas of classroom life. The AUC theater professor said he no
longer requires his students to see films for courses. "Students complained [I
was] exposing them to pornography if there was a kiss or nudity," he said.[325]
Islamists sometimes disrupt class discussion. In fall 2001, while describing
the origins of literature to a class at HilwanUniversity,
al-Sayyid al-Sirwi explained that the art form was born after humans formed
society and created means of communication. "A human being is a social animal,"
he said. "An Islamist student said I should not say this. '[A] human [is] not
an animal. . . . [To say so] is a desecration of God.'"[326]
While the incident may seem like a small one, al-Sayyid al-Sirwi was visibly
disturbed and seemed fearful that such interruptions could lead to professional
repercussions.

Research

Islamist objections also restrict the range of academic
research.The case against Abu Zaid
began as a response to his interpretive scholarship about Quran. According to
one journalist observer, it "resulted in a tacit decision in all Arab language
and philosophy departments to ban registrations of M.A./Ph.D. theses involving
an interpretation of the Quran that might lead to the same problem. Any
academic researcher thinking of an M.A./Ph.D. on a religious subject no longer
has complete freedom to decide the subject."[327]
As representatives of the government, state university officials are legally
bound to protect scholars' academic freedom. In many cases, however, they have
succumbed to Islamist pressure to impose limits on research.

Human Rights Watch
learned of several examples of thesis topics that were discouraged or changed
because they dealt with controversial religious or moral topics. A graduate
student at `Ain Shams who wanted to do her doctorate on a study of Freud and
religious views had "discussion of her work postponed several times . . . to
the extent she couldn't complete it."[328]
About four years ago, a student at al-Fayum branch of CairoUniversity
had her Ph.D. degree forcibly withdrawn after she had been granted it because
her dissertation included a discussion of sex and Islam.[329]
Three years ago, Aida Seif El Dawla
supervised a master's thesis at `Ain Shams on wife battering. The senior
supervisor forced the student to change her topic. When asked if the student
did so, Seif El Dawla responded, "Of course. She [did] it in the first place to
get her degree. . . . Talking in the language of rights is not welcomed in the
university."[330] A Ph.D.
candidate at Hilwan wanted to do a master's thesis on the problems of
interpreting the Quran, arguing one must place it in the context of the
prophet's life. "Most advised him to change the topic. The whole of public
opinion was against him. He changed topics and did something else," al-Sayyid
al-Sirwi said.[331] The
student presumably feared Islamist opposition would prevent him from receiving
a doctorate. Ironically, he was a Muslim Brother who is now in prison for
belonging to an illegal organization. "He is supposed to be affiliated with the
Islamists, but at the same time he had problems with the Islamists for choosing
a liberal topic," said al-Sayyid al-Sirwi.[332]
While the state uses CAPMAS research permit requirements to block scholarship
on political topics, Islamists have foreclosed research on the two other main
red line areas-religion and sex-through intimidation of university officials,
professors, and students.

Student Activities and Campus Protests

The government, through appointed deans and security forces,
causes the most harm to extracurricular life. It generally targets both leftists
and Islamists. In certain faculties, however, professors and students
complained that Islamists, with the administration's approval, often put undue
pressure on their colleagues.

Islamists have been accused of intolerance toward classmates
and have, in some cases, interfered directly with peers' freedom of expression.
`Ain Shams freshman Mustafa said, for example, she went to a campus
demonstration because "I just wanted to express myself."[333]
The Islamists who organized the event, however, told her women were not allowed
to speak at protests. This reception combined with government harassment has
turned Mustafa away from political activity.[334]
Islamist students at the national universities often harass liberal female
classmates for not wearing the niqab,
a full veil. Non-Muslims are also victims of this discrimination. The Islamists
imply that "all women who do not cover offend God, therefore all Christians
offend God. The students feel intimidated," said a Coptic professor from `Ain
Shams, who has noticed increasing extremism on campus.[335]

The state exacerbates this situation by selectively
censoring secular critiques while allowing Islamists to express their views. "I
don't mind giving the floor to the Islamists as long as we get our own space.
If they discuss the Quran, I want to discuss the [Communist] Manifesto of
Marx," said an assistant professor in CairoUniversity's
Faculty of Arts.[336] In the
English department at CairoUniversity, several
professors complained about Islamist posters.University rules require
the administration to approve any posters or exhibitions. In this department,
however, Islamists hang posters without approval, and the administration looks
the other way. "The dean of the Faculty of Arts has almost given a green
[light] to students who belong to Islamist groups to hang stickers, posters calling
for jihad and the hijab. . . . If you allow Islamists to hang posters, you
should allow leftists, Wafdists, Nasserites, communists. Why only the Islamist
point of view?" the Cairo
arts professor said.[337] Leftists
charge Islamist militants with collaborating with the government, a legacy of
the 1970s when Sadat supported Islamists to counter the then-dominant leftists.
Islamists deny that such an alliance exists today. As with book censorship and
restriction of research topics, however, government-appointed officials
accommodate Islamist views on campus, provided they relate to religion and
morals instead of politics. Whether deliberately or not, state and non-state
repression of academic freedom are again inextricably linked.

Conclusion and Recommendations

Though Islamist militants are often at odds with government
authorities and the target of crackdowns themselves, they have come to exert
restrictive influence on university campuses. They have consistently sought to
restrict freedom of opinion, expression, and assembly. Rather than resisting
Islamist pressure on behalf of academic freedom, Egyptian government
authorities and university officials too often have tolerated or supported
their efforts to suppress ideas other than their own. The Egyptian government
must create an environment where academic freedom is respected, i.e., restore
autonomy to the universities and cease violating the rights of individual
members of the community. Such steps would make it harder for those who
challenge academic freedom to achieve their goals. The state should also
actively oppose intolerant individuals or groups who carry out attacks against
academic freedom. For example, it should reject calls to censor books and allow
students to choose their own thesis topics. Rather than combating Islamists'
attempts to limit academic freedom, Egypt has allowed them to deprive
others of their rights.

Human Rights Watch
recommends:

Al-Gihad, al-Gama`a al-Islamiyya, the Muslim Brotherhood, and other
Islamic militants show respect for the academic freedom of others and help
create an environment of tolerance and constructive dialogue on campus.

The
state end its censorship regime to show that all forms of censorship are
unacceptable.

The
university administration ensure that students can pursue research topics
of their choosing.

The
university administration apply its rules without discrimination, giving
members of all political or religious groups equal freedom to express their
views.

VII. Self-Censorship

Violations of academic freedom have been so prevalent and
severe in Egypt
that self-censorship has become common. This chilling effect saps institutions
of the intellectual vitality and creativity that they should seek to foster.
"The general impression one gets is that freedom of expression in many areas is
self-censored. People know if something is frowned on. They take it on themselves
not to press the issue. . . . Both in the press and. . . in academic literature, there is a
climate where people are aware of where the boundaries lie," said Irfan Siddiq,
the head of press and public affairs at the British Embassy.[338]
Self-censorship runs so deep in red line areas, some academics do not even see
it as a significant limitation. "If you don't touch the red lines, you're free
to express your opinion," CairoUniversity engineering
professor el-Raghy told Human Rights Watch.[339] As with
direct repression, self-censorship adversely affects all areas of academic
life.

Classroom

Course Books

Fear of state censorship has led AUC professors to screen
their own course book selections. "We try to choose things the censor won't go
for," said one professor. She explained that some faculty members order a few
books they expect to attract attention, hoping others will pass by unnoticed.
Other professors no longer use a book they did in the past because they want to
"give it a rest. We hope to keep it from being censored."[340]
A professor in the theater department said he does not even order books
anymore. He relies instead on photocopies. "I haven't changed what I teach. I
no longer order books because if I do, I set myself up to inspection." He is
trying to protect the books as well as himself. "If you order books that are
already in [the country], you are endangering them. You have to be devious."[341]

Self-censorship also affects the availability of books at
AUC. Bookstore manager Zaug acknowledged, "You can't just order anything. I'm
banning myself by not ordering certain types of books. I don't want to go
through the hassle." He said, for example, he was "dumb to try" to import a
book entitled Sex Toy of the Gods a
few years ago.[342]Zaug also noted that the censor sometimes
objects to a book over the phone but refuses to file a formal letter; in such
cases, he generally sells the shipment he received but will not reorder the
disputed work. Such defensive behavior may in part explain why, from 2002-2003,
he remembers only one item being banned-the world map with the controversial
Egypt-Sudan border. Self-censorship has affected the AUC Press as well. "Part
of the reason that there have been fewer censored titles in the 1990s is
because of what the Press learned in the 80s. Why even bring up a book for
publication when you are sure it will be censored?" Zaug wrote.[343] By
provoking self-censorship, the state indirectly influences what books are sold
and published on campus. The increase in self-censorship may also explain the
decrease in outright bans; the state does not need to impose them if
universities do not request controversial titles.

Islamist pressure leads to further self-censorship at AUC.
Samia Mehrez said that the Islamists' public attacks for her teaching For Bread Alone made her worry she would
suffer the same fate as Abu Zaid. "Abu Zaid looms large in everybody's head.
He's a scapegoat. You think you may end up like him."[344]
Fear of non-state interference has deterred the library from fighting state
censorship, which keeps controversial volumes on reserve. Challenging the
state-imposed reserve system would bring attention to the fact that the
library's collection includes books some members of society might object to.
"We keep a low profile or get people who don't have good intentions," Dean of
Libraries el Sawy said.[345]

Class Discussion

Self-censorship influences class discussion as well as
syllabi. Human Rights Watch found
comparatively few examples of direct government interference in class
discussion, but red lines limit the topics that can be addressed. "People are
so used to it they censor themselves. They already know what's acceptable," the
AUC theater professor said.[346]
Politics, for example, are largely off limits. "Most professors are quite
cautious," said Mustapha Kamel al-Sayyid, a political scientist who teaches at CairoUniversity
and AUC. "Very few would dare to express views critical of the government in
classes or public meetings. Those who do are a minority."[347]
Even professors who said they felt free to discuss most subjects in the
classroom avoided a topic as significant as the rule of Egypt's president, Hosni Mubarak.
"I haven't felt in the classroom much restrictions," said one sociologist. "I
don't say Mubarak is a dictator, but I do say some states like Egypt
have a lifetime president."[348] A CairoUniversity
professor who said there is "100 percent academic freedom in the classroom,"
later clarified, on condition of anonymity, "You can't attack Mubarak but
anything else is OK."[349] While
not a specific response to direct repression, the self-imposed limits on class
discussion show the power of red lines in Egyptian academia.

Only senior faculty members, whose rank and established
status protect them from some forms of government and public pressure, dare to
cross the red lines. Like al-Sayyid, CairoUniversity's Arabic
literature professor Sayyed el-Bahrawy is a full professor who has been
teaching for more than twenty years. He said, "They can't ask me to change in
the classroom. But weak professors are intimidated, especially about religious
or Islamist problems."[350]
Nadia Touba, an associate professor in the Faculty of Education at AlexandriaUniversity, said she was willing to
cross red lines, but also described herself as someone who does not "compromise
what I think and I get into trouble for it." "People fear being reported. But
if you don't care, what's the problem?" she said.[351]
Many professors do not have the level of seniority or the temperament that
makes them feel comfortable crossing red lines.[352]

Although AUC is a private, liberal arts institution, the
situation there is similar to that at the national universities. Professors'
response to red lines depends, in part, on their seniority and nationality.
Arabic literature professor Samia Mehrez said, "I'm not intimidated in what I
want to teach, but I'm tenured and Egyptian. . . . Foreign faculty are far more
sensitive to what they teach and say in the classroom, how they approach
students. They are on their toes all the time."[353]
More junior professors said they felt less free to voice their opinions. "It's
not acknowledged at AUC, but for faculty members who hold [controversial]
opinions, it's very dangerous professionally. Even if you're not actively
embracing them, political opinions are dangerous," said an American professor
who asked not to be named.[354] Although
it is difficult to prove, the professor said crossing red lines can interfere
with tenure decisions, and foreigners who lose their jobs at AUC often have to
leave the country. In general, politics is a more dangerous subject for
Egyptians and religion a more dangerous subject for foreigners, especially if
they are not Muslim.[355]

Research

State and non-state repression has arguably had an even
greater chilling effect on research than in the classroom. While teaching is
mandatory, professors can more easily avoid scholarship or choose conservative
topics if they fear repercussions. "Everyone is looking for a safe path, to
stay away from danger. We haven't had brilliant research in recent years.
Research is pretty much on the beaten path," said Ahmad Isma`il, editor at
opposition newspaper al-Ahali.[356]
Self-censorship at Egyptian universities has interfered with both the quantity
and quality of research.

The CAPMAS permit system stifles intellectual inquiry not
only because it prohibits investigations of certain topics but also because
some scholars respond by restricting their own research. They choose "safe"
topics, allowing red lines to limit academic freedom. Saad, the AUC researcher,
said, "There are certain things you won't apply for because you know you won't
get a permit." She gave ethnography of the military as an example.[357]
Al-Sayyid said, "There are certain questions that should not be asked. . . .
It's a case of self-censorship. You won't put questions down that you know will
get rejected by the security people."[358]
Al-Sayyid generally avoids surveys because of the CAPMAS requirements and only
applied for his first permit last year. He received permission for a project on
the middle class three months later because it was "not as objectionable" as
other topics, like security.[359] Concern
for their sources also may influence researchers' decisions to avoid
controversial topics. "You don't always want to do something sensitive because
you're not sure you can protect informants. They may be harmed and it's not
just paranoia that they're afraid," Saad said.[360]

The state has so ingrained in academics the danger of
working on red line topics that many do not even consider them legitimate
subjects of research. Asked about the impact of the Saadeddin Ibrahim case,
Egyptian academics were sympathetic but repeatedly noted that the state
targeted him for his research, not his teaching. "He was not criticized for his
AUC lectures," colleague Emad Shahin said.[361]
Such reactions are a reminder of the low priority many professors put on
research, which they consider an optional or less important part of their
careers.[362] They
also viewed his case as an isolated one that would not affect them. Because the
majority of academics avoid the kind of controversial red line research that
Ibrahim and the Ibn Khaldun Center took on, they do not feel restricted by the
threat of prosecution. Such avoidance, however, exemplifies the self-imposed
restrictions placed on freedom of opinion in the realm of scholarly research.

The case of Abu Zaid, by contrast, elicited strong reactions
from academics. HilwanUniversity professor
al-Sayyid al-Sirwi described the case as a "milestone after which academic
freedom declined at rapid speed."[363]
Recent graduate `Imad Mubarak said, "When a student finds his professor
prosecuted, it spreads an atmosphere of fear, terror, and intimidation. It
directly and indirectly affects the educational system."[364]
Part of this reaction may be attributable to the fact that Abu Zaid's ordeal
started with what should have been a routine promotion process, something all
academics go through. In addition, the school had required him to do Quranic
research because they needed that material covered; unlike Ibrahim, Abu Zaid
did not choose his research area and then defy the state by continuing in the
face of government opposition.[365] Egyptian
academics' fear of the Islamists may also explain the more blatant chilling
effect. "[The Abu Zaid case] has greatly affected cultural life in Egypt.
We feel the stakes will be very high, it might be your life. There is an
atmosphere of terror. It's not the administration we have to answer to, but
students, mosque, preacher, parent," al-Sayyid al-Sirwi said.[366] Because
such opponents of academic freedom are less predictable and in some cases more
violent than the state, they can cause more self-censorship by researchers.

Student Activities and Campus Demonstrations

While Egyptian authorities and Islamist militants both
inhibit scholarship, the officials also discourage student activities outside
the classroom. The extensive and sometimes violent interference with student
union elections, for example, has decreased student participation as candidates
and voters. An Islamist professor said his students told him they are afraid to
run. "They don't nominate themselves because they are either arrested or
summoned to university or security forces. They would rather not put themselves
or their parents in that situation. There is a great deal of pressure on them,"
he said.[367] While
fear drives some students away, the student unions' ineffectiveness has caused
others to lose interest. An AlexandriaUniversity student, who
described himself as apolitical, said, "The elections for student union are not
real elections. Nothing happens and nothing changes. Therefore most [students]
don't nominate themselves because they know the results can't be changed."[368]
Engineering professor `Issam Hashish from CairoUniversity
concurred. "Even the students who have no background, no political activity,
are not allowed to join [the union]. Over time they have lost interest in
elections," he said.[369] The lack
of involvement extends even to casting ballots. "The students are increasingly
not voting because they are disillusioned. The student union is seen as a
government body that is not representative of students," said Margo Abdel Aziz,
U.S. Embassy education specialist.[370]
When students keep themselves out of campus politics, they suffer personal
frustration and leave a void in leadership that the administration can fill as
it wishes.

Government repression has also affected campus protests.
News of the demonstration in Alexandria,
for example, quickly spread around the country and frightened students at other
universities. "People are afraid to go out. They killed someone. Maybe some of
us will die," said Bassam Murtada of CairoUniversity.[371] Murtada
said he personally responded with a mixture of surprise, anger, and guilt. He
could not believe violence had reached this level. "The whole thing was turning
into an absurd thing, as if [the campus were] a battlefield. . . . I couldn't
envision how the government instilled in young people that they are in war. . .
. The government won't stop anywhere, it will go all the way."[372]Murtada also felt guilty for recruiting
classmates for demonstrations because he now feared for himself and others.
"The guy who died died an absurd death," he said. "He was a human being who
thought he had a right to express himself, that his voice would make a
difference. It was a very absurd death. It makes you think about life."[373] The
violence of the state security forces not only stifled the specific protest in Alexandria but also forced
others, even activist students, to think twice before joining campus
demonstrations.

Fearing the state's intimidation tactics, students tend to
avoid not only activism but also their activist peers.[374]
"Many of my colleagues are afraid to talk to me," `Ain Shams student Mai
Mustafa said. "They don't care about politics. They just study and go home
safely. . . . Mostly they are afraid to get involved." Iman Kamil, an `Ain
Shams graduate, said ordinary students did not to want to talk to her because
they believed she was a "bad person." "It increases the demoralization of
others and discourages them from being involved," she said.[375]
Only those truly committed to their cause persevere in such an environment.

Self-censorship in student activities and campus
demonstrations not only creates a less stimulating academic environment on
campus, but it also ill-prepares Egypt's youth to be active political citizens
as adults. Students do not learn how politics work and may associate activism
with abuse. The result is a population unwilling to challenge the status quo.

Conclusion and Recommendations

Self-censorship results from pervasive academic freedom
violations of two sorts. First, the state directly infringes on freedom of
expression, association, and assembly, creating powerful disincentives to
participation in university life. Professors and students do not feel free to
exchange ideas or gather formally or informally. Even freedom of opinion has
been affected. Siddiq noted, "Self censorship inhibits thinking as well as
expression."[376] Second,
state authorities have failed in their ICCPR Article 2 duty to ensure these
rights are protected against intrusion by others. While not every academic who
chooses to censor him or herself has necessarily been repressed by the state,
the fact that many choose to do so reflects the general climate of fear present
on campus. The state has a legal duty to remove that fear, whether state officials
or private groups cause it. The latter, notably Islamist militants, have also
failed in their obligation to respect the academic freedom of others.

To combat these problems, Human
Rights Watch recommends:

The
state remove the direct repression that has led to self-censorship,
including censorship of imported books, CAPMAS permit requirements,
interference with student union elections, and violent responses to
protests.

Al-Gihad, al-Gama`a al-Islamiyya, the Muslim Brotherhood, and other
Islamic militants cease direct threats and other actions that have had a
chilling effect on course books and research topics.

The
state defend academics who are targeted by non-state actors' attempts to
restrict academic freedom.

VIII. Institutional Restrictions and Proposed Reforms

Egyptian academics suffer not only from direct repression
and self-censorship but also, as many are quick to point out, from
institutional restrictions on quality education. These restrictions stem from
the structure of the state university system and matters under control of the
Ministry of Higher Education. While such problems themselves do not directly
violate rights, they demoralize members of the academy and compel them to turn
elsewhere for personal and professional satisfaction.[377]
In recent years, both the Egyptian state and international organizations have
recognized these educational problems and offered recommendations to ameliorate
them.

Violations of University Autonomy: Professors and Promotions

State control of appointment and promotion governs
professional advancement in Egyptian universities. This violation of university
autonomy discourages individual initiative and provides disincentives for
independent thought. Instead of having students interested in academia apply to
graduate programs, the top few graduates in every class receive appointments as
lecturers. "Once you're tapped [for a professorship] that's what you'll
become," said Fulbright director Ann Radwan.[378]
In the English Department at CairoUniversity, for example,
top students become "junior assistants" who teach English to non-majors.[379] They
continue to teach while they get their master's and Ph.D. and receive state
assistance for research related to their thesis and dissertation. Those who
finish their doctorates receive professorial appointments.

Promotion at all levels is close to automatic provided one
does not stray too far into red line areas. "If you live long enough, you'll
become full professor," Radwan said.[380]
The progression moves from assistant to lecturer, once the Ph.D. is complete.
Usually lecturers become assistant professors after five years, associates
after ten years, and full professors after fifteen years.[381]
"Cases in which promotion is a problem or delayed are rare," Hamzawy said.
"They are related to highly controversial issues like Abu Zaid."[382] Others
agreed that the Abu Zaid case was an aberration. According to el-Bahrawy, "In
the case of Abu Zaid, there were some religious and political issues that the
committee didn't like."[383]
Although promotion is rarely denied, the system involves government intrusions
on university autonomy.

Promotion depends on tailoring research to state-imposed
standards rather than increasing knowledge in the field. "If you are a master's
student, you have to publish a certain number of research [articles] to get
promoted. . . . Supervisors have to agree with what you're saying and choose
the subject," Seif El Dawla said.[384]
A national review committee, instead of a panel of university peers, makes
decisions on professorial promotions. It judges cases based on twenty-five
percent department performance (including teaching and committee work) and
seventy-five percent research. Under these circumstances, research has become
primarily a means to an end. "Little is done for the sake of research. It has a
function, to get a promotion or degree," Seif El Dawla said.[385] State
control of research at all levels has given professors more reason to fear
straying into controversial red line areas and hindered innovation in Egyptian
scholarship.

For those who follow the rules, professorial promotion is
relatively automatic, but appointment to an administrative position is more
narrowly restricted to supporters of the Mubarak government. El-Bahrawy said,
"In administrative positions, political views affect [promotion] 200 percent."[386] This
process interferes with academic freedom by limiting advancement opportunities
for outspoken professors. If professors want to be deans someday, they must
work with the government and avoid any controversial research. "On the whole,
the government has great respect for courageous and independent and competent
professors. They might express displeasure but no further. But [these
professors] won't become deans or rectors," al-Sayyid explained.[387] This
appointment system punishes independent thought and puts more intellectually
conservative academics in leadership positions.

Lack of Choice: Student Apathy and Frustration

The national universities give students few choices in their
education. When high school students graduate from secondary school, they take
an exam that determines which university and which faculty they will go to.
They have the option of taking the science or humanities exam, but otherwise
their test scores determine their future. "If you get good grades, you go to
the Faculty of Medicine no matter what you want to do. It's command education,"
Radwan said.[388] Because
Egyptian students are not free to choose which faculty they enroll in, they do
not necessarily study the subjects that most interest them and are often less
committed to the learning process.

Once at university, students find education very rigid. The
curriculum is largely standardized, and they have virtually no electives. Class
sizes are huge and teaching is done primarily in lectures. At CairoUniversity,
the Faculties of Law and Commerce commonly have two thousand students per
class.[389] Many
students said they skip class and just take the exams at the end of the
semester. "The whole process of education is based mainly on learning by
heart," said Seif El Dawla.[390] If
students fail a course, they have to take it again before moving on to the next
year of college, thus delaying the rest of their education. The impersonal
character of the university system, standardized curriculum, and lack of class
discussion dampen enthusiasm for learning.

While a rigid educational system is not uncommon in certain
parts of the world, Egyptian students repeatedly expressed frustration. `Ain
Shams student Mustafa, who was having difficulty interpreting Machiavelli, said
her professor told her, "Just memorize it, don't understand." She added, "You
can't challenge any doctor [of philosophy]."[391]
Muhammad Faruq said he feels stifled by the system. "The whole educational
system doesn't encourage creativity.It's
a way of thinking, way of upbringing. It doesn't allow for different points of
view. . . . We memorize like parrots. If you don't write exactly what the
professor says, you don't get good grades," Faruq said.[392]
He contrasted the national university system to AUC where students can choose
courses and research topics. "It helps to make students feel like humans. Their
point of view is important. It helps to introduce better humans into society."[393] Nadir
Muhammad said students in the state universities have to make an effort to find
the good professors and "spark debate" in the classroom.[394]
The administration, however, sometimes cuts such professors off from their
students. "Professors are fixed in their jobs like tenure, but if they dissent,
they give him a salary but won't let him teach, or only [for] a few hours, or
only [at a] post-graduate level," the al-Ahram
journalist said.[395] Rather
than serve as intellectual role models for students, professors often become
part of the state's repressive system.

Budgetary Burdens

Budget limitations exacerbate the other institutional
restrictions on Egyptian intellectual life. Although the university's budget
has increased in recent years, its resources are still insufficient. Minister
of Higher Education Shehab said his ministry's budget, which was 4.7 billion LE
(about $763 million) in 2003, is inadequate.[396]
"Of course it's not enough for the number of students, but when you compare to
twenty years ago, it was 283 million LE [$45.9 million]. The government is
giving more but still not enough," the minister said.[397]

Professors

Professors frequently complain about insufficient salaries.
Al-Sayyid, a full professor at CairoUniversity, makes 1,800
LE, or $292, per month.[398] He
supplements this income by teaching at AUC and serving as director of the
Center for the Study of Developing Countries at CairoUniversity.[399]
El-Bahrawy, a full professor in CairoUniversity's Arab
Language and Literature Department, makes 2,000 LE, or $325, per month. He said
his base salary is much less-about 300 LE, or $49-but it is supplemented with
money for administrative work and thesis advising.[400]
An `Ain Shams professor who is on leave at a private university described the
financial situation as "devastating." "Salaries are not at a human level. The basic
salary is embarrassingly funny. An associate professor makes not more than 500
LE [$81] a month. You never exceed 2,000 LE," she said.[401]
When teaching at `Ain Shams, she said she "always had to look for extra work to
do. I needed another [means] of living."[402]
A lecturer in CairoUniversity's Faculty of
Arts reported that salaries are very small compared to those at private
universities or in other fields. "The decision to remain in the university is
not an easy one to make," she said.[403]

The low salaries affect the quality of teaching and research
in Egypt.
Many professors increase their earnings by selling books or photocopied packets
to students. They prefer large classes because they can make more money and in
the process increase the student-faculty ratio. "It's not what they can teach
them, it's what they can sell them," said Nadia Touba of AlexandriaUniversity.
"It's the result of the economic circumstances here."[404]
The salary problem has affected scholarship because many professors no longer
prioritize research. They use their free time to teach at private universities
or to take high-paying consultancies. "They work in the morning in national
universities, then go to private universities to work. Therefore there is no
time to do academic research," el-Bahrawysaid.[405] Earning
enough money, not teaching and scholarship, is the main goal of many
professors.

Dissatisfaction with salaries has caused an exodus of
Egyptian academics to the Gulf states
where salaries are significantly higher. "The door is open to thousands of
professors to work in the Gulf," el-Bahrawy said.[406]
This emigration deprives Egypt
of some of its homegrown academics. Those who do return bring back the region's
more socially, intellectually, and religiously conservative attitudes. "Some
university professors who go to the Gulf come back to spread the culture of the
Gulf to their students," the al-Ahram
journalist said. "The first to separate girls and boys in lectures were from Saudi Arabia."[407] Such
imported practices move Egypt
even further from a system of education that respects and protects academic
freedom.

Students

Although advanced education in Egypt is state-funded, students
complain about the need for more financial support. First, many students find
they cannot afford textbooks. They try to use cheaper photocopied versions, but
some professors who depend on book royalties to supplement their meager income
will compel their students to buy their books. They ask the bookstore to keep
track of who purchases books and penalize students with bad grades if they are
not on the list.[408] "You
have to buy books [inside campus] because professors intimidate students. Most
students cannot afford them," Murtada said.[409]
Second, although university education is free in principle, the universities do
charge a small annual fee of about 80 LE, or $13, which can be difficult for
poor students. The state has no system of financial aid to help low-income
students cover the costs of books and fees. Interviewees from Cairo,
`Ain Shams, and Alexandria
universities echoed these concerns.

Facilities

Both professors and students complained about poor
facilities. Professors have to rely on their own resources for professional
necessities. "There is no motivation even if you want to do work well. There is
no pay, no facilities," al-Sayyid said.[410]
In CairoUniversity's Faculty of Economics and
Political Sciences, six professors share one office. An assistant lecturer in
the Faculty of Arts said she did not have an office and worked at home.[411]
Professors repeatedly disparaged the quality of university libraries.
"Libraries, laboratories, and computer labs are at a very elementary level.
It's all a matter of resources and administration and management," an `Ain
Shams professor said.[412] Rachid
described the library in her faculty as "very bad" without a budget to buy new
books.[413] The
situation is even worse for those who need labs, and professors in the natural
and physical sciences thus have priority when the state sends academics abroad.[414] Students
suffer not only from poor libraries and labs but also from decrepit hostels,
where out-of-town students live. The rising number of students makes matters
worse. "There is something wrong in the system of education. There is not
enough money or facilities," Murtada said.[415]

Proposed Reforms

Both national and international bodies have recognized Egypt's
educational problems and called for reform. In 2000, the Ministry of Higher
Education published a twenty-five step strategic plan to improve Egyptian
universities. These reforms have yet to be implemented, but they provide useful
recommendations to supplement those in this report. In 2002 and 2003, the
United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) issued Arab Human Development Reports, which include assessments of
contemporary education and its potential impact on the Arab world.

The Ministry of Higher Education's "Strategic Plan"

When asked about the universities' poor condition, Minister
of Higher Education Shehab emphasized his package of proposed reforms. The
"Strategic Plan to Reform the System of Higher Education" includes twenty-five
projects designed to improve university education in Egypt.[416]
They do not directly address the more egregious academic freedom violations
discussed in chapters five through seven of this report, but they offer some
possibilities for improving the institutional structure. For these reforms to
be more than hollow promises, the ministry must ensure that they are
implemented in a way that upholds international standards for academic freedom.

The proposed reforms are designed in part to improve the
quality of higher education. "We've lived for forty years taking care of
numbers, and not qualitative [changes]. Now we're trying to balance quality and
quantity," Minister Shehab said.[417]
The plan, for example, gives students more choice in their education. The sixth
project modifies the matriculation process so that students' placements are
based on "the capabilities of students enrolling and their interests, in
addition to their cumulative grades."[418]
Such a reform could increase students' involvement in and enthusiasm for their
education and better match skills to potential careers. The eighteenth project
tries to help students at the other end of their education by studying how
successful they are in finding appropriate jobs.[419]

Other projects focus on improving facilities. The seventh
project seeks to improve the libraries, which many academics described as
disastrous. While well-intended, this project calls for an assessment and
strategic plan instead of actual improvements based on available resources. It
does not address the censorship of imported books.[420]
Project twenty-three calls for new sources of financing for the national
universities.[421]
According to the minister, the state has asked for an 11 million Euro ($13.6
million) grant to help fund the reforms. The World Bank has already agreed to
disburse a $50 million, or 312 million LE, loan from 2002 to 2007 to pay for
eleven reform projects, and the Egyptian government has pledged 720 million LE,
or $117 million, over five years to contribute to the plan's implementation.[422]

At least two of the projects have the potential to increase
academic freedom in Egypt,
but if implemented improperly, they could make the situation worse. The first
project would create a new university law.[423]
As discussed above, the University Law of 1979 is one of the major obstacles to
academic freedom on campus. Drafting new legislation would give the ministry
the opportunity to reform problems like the deans appointment process or the
"good conduct" clause for student union elections. The project says
universities should "achiev[e] financial and administrative independence,"
which would also increase their autonomy.[424]
New legislation, however, could tighten restrictions on academic freedom if international
law is not heeded. The twentieth project requires a review of "prevailing
techniques in cultural, artistic, and athletic extra-curricular student
activities."[425] Such
activities need major reform because the university administration and state police
have prevented them from being meaningful forums for expression. The proposal
also calls for "deepening national feelings and creating a unity of values of
morals."[426] This
clause suggests that the project might be used to decrease rather than increase
freedom in student activities.

The Strategic Plan
is far from a panacea and at this point it remains a paper proposal. It does
have potential to improve university life in some ways. To ensure that any
changes have a positive effect on higher education, the ministry should bear in
mind the recommendations of this report as well as the principles of academic
freedom when implementing the proposed reforms.

UNDP Reports

The UNDP has issued two Arab
Human Development Reports that address education in the Arab world. The
2002 report found that the education in the region generally compares
unfavorably to that of other countries. The UNDP concluded, "Arab countries
have made great strides in education, particularly since the middle of the
twentieth century. Nevertheless, educational achievement in the Arab countries
as a whole, judged even by traditional criteria, is still modest when compared
to elsewhere in the world, even in developing countries."[427]
It describes quality as "the Achilles heel of education in the Arab world."[428] The
findings accurately describe the situation in Egypt, reflecting poorly on the
region's historic intellectual leader and role model.

The report offers recommendations to address these
shortcomings at all levels of education. Of particular relevance here are four
reforms that the UNDP says are "urgently needed" to improve higher education.
The first relates directly to one of the core principles of academic
freedom-university autonomy. "[H]igher education should be liberated from the domination
of both government and the unregulated profit motive," the report says.[429] While
the state should retain responsibility for facilitating reforms, it should free
universities so that they are run by independent boards. The second and third
reforms address some of the institutional restrictions on university education
described above. The second calls for expansion, without "a deterioration of
quality," and the third a "powerful shake-up to improve quality." According to
the UNDP, improved quality involves a financial investment that includes
increasing salaries, bettering facilities, and enhancing "teaching and research
capacities."[430] The
study also calls on the government to reform its rigid matriculation system.
Fourth and finally, it argues for additional "flexibility" to allow students
and universities to adapt to a rapidly changing world. It urges universities to
use a variety of educational methods, continuously adapt to changing
circumstances with new technologies, and provide students the opportunity to
engage in lifelong learning.[431] If
implemented, such reforms would help alleviate the academic freedom repression
and institutional restrictions that pervade Egypt's universities.

In its 2003 Arab Human
Development Report, the UNDP focuses on building a "knowledge society" in
the Arab world and expands its analysis of the state of education in the
region. The report reiterates the reforms proposed in 2002 for higher education
and continues to emphasize the need for greater autonomy and better quality. It
also addresses specifically concerns raised here about Egypt, most notably, the importance
of protecting freedom of opinion, expression, association, and assembly. As the
UNDP report phrases it, it is "imperative to end the era of administrative control and the grip of
security agencies over the production and dissemination of knowledge."[432] The
report also calls attention to the role of non-state actors in repressing
intellectual freedom. It finds, "Official and unofficial religious circles have
also sought to muzzle freedom of opinion and speech through censorship, banning
and libel."[433] If
existing conditions are not remedied, the report concludes, "Arabs [will]
remain in a marginal position in this next phase of human history."[434]

IX.
Conclusion

Higher education in Egypt is in urgent need of reform.
Systemic government repression has stifled the four major areas of university
life-the classroom, research, student activities, and campus protests. Private
actors, primarily Islamist militants, have produced an atmosphere of
intimidation that authorities have abetted in some cases and tolerated in
others to the further detriment of academic freedom. Self-censorship and
institutional problems also contribute to a climate where professors and
students are too fearful or apathetic to challenge the status quo. Together
these factors violate Egyptian academics' rights to freedom of opinion,
expression, association, and assembly as well as university autonomy. To regain
its intellectual leadership in the Arab world, Egypt must free its universities
from these restrictions and create an environment where academic freedom is
allowed to flourish.

Appendix

The National Conference on Higher
Education

The Strategic Plan to Reform the
Organization of Higher Education

February 13-14, 2000

Project 1Preparation
of new legislation for higher education

Project 2Preparation
of a new organizational map for higher education

Project 3Development
and rearrangement of colleges of education and teacher

preparation

Project 4Creation
of a national center for the development of technologies and

teaching
aides and the development of systems and testing techniques

Project 5Complete
overhaul for curricula and training courses

Project 6 Development
of processes for enrollment in higher education

Project 7Improvement
of libraries, sources of information, and educational

materials

Project 8Improvement
of higher and mid-level institutes

Project 9Evaluation
and development of systems and programs and technologies

for
"open education" and new modes of higher education

Project 10Intensification
of IT use and development of systems for decision-

making
processes

Project 11Rearrangement
of scientific departments and planning of vocational

structures

Project 12Creation
of the national center for the creation and development of

faculty
affairs

Project 13Development
of higher education systems and programs

Project 14Support
and development of systems and methods for scientific

research

Project 15Modernization
of administration of higher education

Project 16Creation
of the national center for the development of administrative

leadership
in higher education

Project 17 Intensification
of bonds between institutes of higher education in the

sectors
of industry

Project 18Establishment
of a center for the monitoring and integration of higher

education
graduates into the work force

Project 19Development
of scientific cooperation and exchange between Egyptian

institutes
of higher education and others abroad as well as the utilization

of
Egyptian scientists abroad

Project 20Cultural,
artistic, athletic, and social development of the student body

Project 21Development
of mechanisms to cater to the gifted and accelerated

students

Project 22Support
of programs in project 21 in higher education and the creation

of
a roadmap for them

Project 23Development
of multiple additional sources for the financing of higher

education

Project 24Creation
of a national system for quality control and accountability

Project 25Creation of an "equivalence" system
for degrees from institutes of higher education

Maps

-

Acknowledgments

Bonnie Docherty,
researcher for the Academic Freedom Program at Human
Rights Watch, researched and wrote this report. Peter
McCormick, consultant to Human Rights Watch,
Joseph Saunders, deputy program
director of Human Rights Watch, Joe Stork, deputy director of the Middle
East and North Africa Division, Wilder
Tayler, legal and policy director of Human
Rights Watch, and Sam Zia-Zarifi, deputy director of the Asia
Division and former director of the Academic Freedom Program, reviewed and
edited the report. Tommy Yeh, then associate with the Academic Freedom Program,
provided logistical assistance. Research assistance was provided by interns
Nesma Farahat, Ashlee Hardesty, and Javier Stark and by Carly
Tubbs, associate with the Arms Division. Dalia Haj-Omar, then
associate with the Middle East and North
Africa Division, provided translation assistance. Mohamed
Abdel Dayem and Tarek Radwan,
associates with the Middle East and North Africa Division, provided
transliteration, translation, and research assistance. Tarek
Radwan also provided production assistance. Veronica Matushaj,
photo editor and associate director of Creative Services for Human Rights Watch, provided assistance with the
photographs. Andrea Holley,
publications director for Human Rights Watch,
and Fitzroy Hepkins, mail manager,
made possible the production of this report.

We owe special thanks to Matthew McKinzie of the Natural
Resources Defense Council, who produced the maps in this report for Human Rights Watch.

Human Rights Watch
would also like to thank all the individuals in Egypt,
the United States,
and other countries who provided information or testimony for this report. We
are particularly grateful to the professors and students from Egyptian
universities who shared their stories.

Finally, Human Rights Watch
would like to express its appreciation for the Ford Foundation's financial
support of our academic freedom work.

[2]Human Rights Watch
interview with Ann Radwan, executive director, Binational Fulbright Commission,
Cairo, February
20, 2003. This report uses the actual names of interviewees unless a name is
withheld to protect someone. In that case, the person is identified by their
status (such as professor or student at a particular university).

[3]Human Rights Watch has criticized the academic freedom situation in a number
of countries, including Afghanistan,
China, Ethiopia, Indonesia,
Iran, Israel, and Turkey.

[6]The State Department went on to
say, "However, deans were government-appointed rather than elected by the
faculty. The Government justified the measure as a means to combat Islamist
influence on campus. The Government also occasionally banned books for use on
campuses, although no such cases occurred during the year." U.S. Department of State, Country Reports
on Human Rights Practices 2002, March 31, 2003,
http://www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/hrrpt/2002/18274.htm (retrieved May 27, 2004).
Its 2003 and 2004 reports do not discuss the deterrent effect of the Ibrahim
case but make the same assessment of academic freedom. U.S. Department of
State, Country Reports on Human Rights Practices 2003, February 25, 2004,http://www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/hrrpt/2003/27926.htm
(retrieved May 27, 2004); U.S.Department
of State,Country
Reports on Human Rights Practices 2004, February 28, 2005,
http://www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/hrrpt/2004/41720.htm (retrieved March 31, 2005).

[7]National Commission on Terrorist
Attacks, The 9/11 Commission Report: Final Report of the National Commission on
Terrorist Attacks upon the United States
(Washington, D.C.:
U.S.
Government Printing Office, 2004), pp. 377-78.

[10]Committee on Economic, Social
and Cultural Rights (CESCR), General Comment 13: The Right to Education,
E/C.12/1999/10, 1999, paras. 6, 17-20. For ratification information, see Office
of the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, Status of Ratification of the
Principle International Human Rights Treaties, as of June 9, 2004, p. 4,
http://www.unhchr.ch/pdf/report.pdf (retrieved July 21, 2004).

[20]
Promotion and Protection of the Right to Freedom of Opinion and Expression:
Report of the Special Rapporteur, Mr. Abid Hussain, pursuant to Commission on
Human Rights Resolution 1993/45, Fifty-First Session, E/CN.4/1995/32, December 14, 1994, para.
27.

[25]
Manfred Nowak, U.N. Covenant on Civil and
Political Rights, p. 351. See, e.g., Article 19, "The Johannesburg
Principles on National Security, Freedom of Expression and Access to
Information," November 1996, http://www.article19.org/docimages/511.htm (retrieved
July 21, 2004).

[26]
"Only with respect to pre-censorship
do the travaux prparatoires reveal that an absolute prohibition was intended."
Manfred Nowak, U.N. Covenant on Civil and
Political Rights, p. 345.

[27]
Ibid., p. 352 ("the relatively limited number of reasons for permissible
interference indicates that such are to be interpreted narrowly in cases of
doubt."). For example, restrictions "to protect national security are
permissible only in serious cases of political or military threat to the entire
nation." Ibid., p. 355.

[35]
Other legitimate interferences must be "in the interests of national security
or public safety, public order (ordre
public), the protection of public health or morals or the protection of the
rights and freedoms of others." ICCPR, art. 22(2).

[37]
ICCPR, art. 21. The UDHR lists freedom of assembly along with freedom of
association in Article 20.

[38]
Manfred Nowak, U.N. Covenant on Civil and
Political Rights, p. 372. "Assembly" refers to "intentional, temporary
gatherings of several persons for a specific purpose." Ibid., p. 373. Nowak
explains, "From its location in the Covenant following freedom of expression,
it may therefore be inferred that the specific protection of freedom of
assembly aims at the discussion or
proclamation of information and ideas within the meaning of Art. 19(2) that
is not dealt with or guaranteed elsewhere." Ibid., p. 374.

[41]
These duties represent, respectively, the negative and positive character of
civil and political rights. Manfred Nowak, U.N.
Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, pp. 36-37.

[42]
Article 2(2) of the ICESCR says, "Each State Party to the present Covenant undertakes to take steps, individually
and through international assistance and cooperation, especially economic and
technical, to the maximum of its available resources, with a view to achieving
progressively the full realization of the rights recognized in the present
Covenant by all appropriate means, including particularly the adoption of
legislative measures." ICESCR, art. 2(2) (emphasis added).

[44]
Nowak explains that the rights relevant to academic freedom all have
"horizontal effects," which means states are obligated to ensure they are not
violated by private parties. Manfred Nowak, U.N.
Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, pp. 340, 344, 387, and 375 (freedom
of opinion, expression, association, and assembly, respectively).

[57]
Donald Malcolm Reid, CairoUniversity and the Making of Modern Egypt (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990), p. 12. Unless
otherwise noted, historical information and statistics in this chapter come
from this book.

[63]
The Arabic names in this report have been transliterated in a standard way,
unless they belong to authors who published in English or interviewees who
offered preferred English spellings of their names.

[71]
While AUC is the oldest and most prestigious private university in Egypt,
other private institutions have sprouted up in recent years. In 1996,
presidential decrees established four such universities: the Sixth of October
University, OctoberUniversity for Modern Sciences and Arts, Misr
University for Sciences and Technology, and the MisrInternationalUniversity. Information Unit Periodical, p. 38.

[77]
"Factions without one comprehensive vision for change led to disintegration of
the movement. There was no transfer of experience from the 1970s to the next
generation." Human Rights Watch
interview with Tamir Sulaiman Ibrahim, Cairo,
February 20, 2003.

[94]Human Rights Watch interview with
AUC professor, Cairo,
February 16, 2003. This professor said, "I am very much against the policies of
the Israeli government. . . . What is the politically most effective means of
changing minds? I think it's to intimidate people with your opinion." Many of
her colleagues, however, feel it is preferable to avoid contact. Ibid.

[102]
The police called her parents when she was in school, but her father was an
activist himself. He ignored the threats and encouraged her to do what she
believed in. Human Rights Watch
interview with Iman Kamil, Cairo,
February 24, 2003.

[108]
In July 2004, Minister of Higher Education Moufid Shehab was replaced by Amr
Ezzat Salama, former president of HilwanUniversity. President
Mubarak's new prime minister, Ahmed Nazif, appointed Salama "to help Egypt
become a modern knowledge-based society." Remmy Nweke, "Software Expert to Head
Egyptian Government," All Africa, July 21,
2004.

[112]Human Rights Watch interview with
Mustapha Kamel al-Sayyid, professor, Political Science Department, Faculty of
Economics and Political Sciences, Cairo University, and Political Science
Department, AUC, Cairo, February 25, 2003. Al-Sayyid said he challenged the
policy change and upset the administration. An administration official told
him, "You are leading a revolution," to which he responded, "If you are
unhappy, take me to court." The administration official declined, saying "No, I
don't want to make a hero out of you." Ibid.

[117]
Dar al-`Ulum literally means "House of Knowledge." This faculty focuses on
Islamic studies, and its departments include Arabic grammar and literature and
Islamic law, philosophy, and history and civilization. "CairoUniversity:
Faculty of Dar El-Ulum," http://www.cu.edu.eg/Faculties/darelalum.asp
(retrieved March 18, 2005).

[140]
For example, the state has banned the English translations of the Arabic novels
Cities of Salt by Abdelrahman Munif
and Women of Sand and Myrrh by Hanan
al-Shaykh. Human Rights Watch
interview with Ferial Ghazoul, professor, Department of English and Comparative
Literature, AUC, Cairo,
March 3, 2003.

[144]
The Egyptian government, however, has abused the Internet to entrap
homosexuals, leading to their arrest and interrogation. Human
Rights Watch, In a Time
of Torture: The Assault on Justice in Egypt's Crackdown on Homosexual Conduct
(New York: Human Rights Watch, 2004), pp. 73-87.

[153]
The course book censorship is part of a four-pronged mechanism of censorship.
As just discussed, the Ministry of Information reviews books and periodicals
that are imported into the country. The Ministry of Interior confiscates or
shut downs what it does not like. The Ministry of Culture reviews theatrical
performances and plays. And al-Azhar reviews any materials dealing with
religion. The Ministry of Information has had the greatest impact on course
books, but because it only censors books coming into the country, it has
primarily impacted AUC, which regularly imports English books from abroad. Mike
Zaug, "The Challenges of Bookselling in Egypt," c. 2001.

[156]
Pamela Nice, "Letter from Cairo:
Creating (and Destroying) a Culture of Inquiry," al-Jadid, Fall 2000, p. 3. Controversial plays, such as Bay the Moon and more recently the Vagina Monologues, can usually only be
performed in front of private, invitation only audiences. Christopher Walker,
"Underground Celebration," The Cairo
Times, February 26-March 3, 2004,
http://www.cairotimes.com/content/archiv07/vagina0749.html (retrieved August 5,
2004).

[182]Human Rights Watch interview with
Saadeddin Ibrahim, professor of sociology, Department of Sociology,
Anthropology, Psychology, and Egyptology, AUC, Cairo, February 24, 2003 ("They
demand that you keep them informed of your work and findings.").

[193]
For more detailed information about this case, see Human
Rights Watch, "The State of Egypt vs. Free Expression," A Human Rights
Watch Report, vol. 14, no. 1 (E), January 2002. Unless
otherwise noted, the information in this section comes from that report.

[195]This law, Military Decree No. 4/1992,
has been used to crack down on NGOs, such as the Egyptian Organization of Human
Rights. Joint Statement by Seven Human Rights Organizations (including Human Rights Watch), "Egypt: Concerns about Ongoing
Detention of Human Rights Defenders," July 14, 2000.

[243]
One AUC student said of her classmates, "Students are largely apolitical. They
don't think they can make a difference. . . . There's a sense of hopelessness."
Human Rights Watch interview with
AUC graduate student, Cairo,
February 26, 2003.

[246]Manfred
Nowak, U.N. Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, p. 387. According to this
authoritative treatise on the ICCPR, associations do not include "juridical
persons [i.e., legal entities] under public law, since they are not founded as
a result of declaration of will by individuals but rather by law or
administrative act." Ibid. Because student unions in Egypt are created by the University
Law, they do not count as associations under this definition. They should be established
under a different authority, however, because the current system violates
university autonomy.

[247]
The government relies on three laws to stop public protests: Law No. 10/1914,
Law No. 14/1923, and Law No. 162/1958 (the Emergency Law).

[248]
For these figures and more information on this protest, see Imam Raslan,
"Special File: Students and Politics," Almussawar,
May 3, 2002, pp. 14-16.

[251]
"Egyptian Student Killed in Anti-US Protest," Agence France-Presse, April 9,
2002 (quoting the interior ministry's statement that police fired in response
to student stone throwing); One Student Killed in Most Violent Anti-Israeli
Protest in Egypt," Associated Press Newswires, April 9, 2002 (saying that
students responded to the live ammunition with stones).

[277]
Email from Mohamed Zarea, director,
Human Rights Association for the Assistance of Prisoners, to Human Rights Watch, August 19, 2004. The Egyptian Organization for
Human Rights also recently reported that there are at least 16,000 political
prisoners. Christopher Walker, "Hunger Strike Reflects Wider Issue of Prisoners
in Egypt," The Daily Star (Beirut), June 8, 2004.

[278]
Islamist and other students represent about forty percent of Egypt's
estimated 16,000 political prisoners. Email from Mohamed
Zarea, director, Human Rights Association for the Assistance of Prisoners, to Human Rights Watch, August 19, 2004.

[287]Human Rights Watch interview with
Muslim Brother student, Cairo,
March 5, 2003. At the main state security office in Cairo, this student, who asked not to be
identified, endured four days of particularly severe torture during which he
was allegedly electrocuted, beaten and forced to stand up for long periods. He
was blindfolded throughout his interrogation, which tried to compel him to give
information on colleagues. Ibid.

[298]
Ibid., pp. 163-71. For more information on the Abu Zaid case, see Nasr Hamid
Abu Zayd, "'Silencing Is at the Heart of My Case,'" in Joel Beinin and Joe Stork, eds., Political
Islam: Essays from Middle East Report (Berkeley, University of California
Press, 1997), pp. 327-34.

[299]Geneive
Abdo, No God but God, p. 67. The assailants said they followed an order from
Shaikh `Omar `Abd al-Rahman, a hard-line cleric who was convicted of seditiousconspiracy
in the 1993 terroristattack on theWorldTradeCenter in New
York City. Ibid.; "Weekend Edition-Sunday," National
Public Radio transcript, October
1, 1995.

[302]
"Islam Leader Condemns Syrian Novel after Riot," Reuters News, May 18, 2000;
Nada Ibrahim, "With Arrests, Culture Minister Filing Complaint," Associated
Press, May 18, 2000; Nada Ibrahim, "Egyptian Creative Community Chilled by
Attack on Novel," Associated Press, July 6, 2000 (quoting several members of
the artistic community saying they had censored themselves as a result of the
incident).

[303]
Geneive Abdo, No God but God, p. 171.
For a discussion of the new law, Law on Ordering of Procedure for Initiating Hisba Cases in Matters of Personal
Status, Law No. 3/1996, see George N. Sfeir, "Basic Freedoms in a Fractured
Legal Culture: Egypt and the Case of Nasr Hamid Abu Zayd," Middle East Journal, vol. 52, no. 3, July 1, 1998.

[310]
Ibid. See also Memorandum to All AUC Faculty from Samia Mehrez, Subject:
Meeting with President Gerhart, Provost Sullivan, Dean Nelson and Dr. Ikram,
December 27, 1998 ("Dr. Ikram added that the unidentified parents were certain
that I was teaching a banned book, and were threatening to go to the press.").

[311]
Letter to the Affirmative Office, the AmericanUniversity in Cairo, around January 12, 1999.

[316]
Letter to Colleagues from Magda al-Nowaihi, ColumbiaUniversity, and Muhammad Siddiq, University of California,
Berkeley,
January 20, 1999. According to this letter, "a public campaign was launched by
some of the Egyptian newspapers to discredit Professor Mehrez and to embarrass
the AmericanUniversity." The incident also led to
the removal from the bookstore of several volumes, including Ahdaf Soueif's In the Eye of the Sun, Sonallah
Ibrahim's The Smell of It, and Alifa
Rifaat's Distant View of a Minaret.
Ibid.

[317]Human Rights Watch interview with
Samia Mehrez, associate professor, Department of Arabic Studies, AUC, February
16, 2003. For more information on this case, see Letter to John Gerhart,
president, AUC, from MESA, May 21, 1999,
http://w3fp.arizona.edu/mesassoc/CAFMENAletters.htm#0521AUC (retrieved July 30,
2004); Letter to President Hosni Mubarak, from MESA, May 21, 1999,
http://w3fp.arizona.edu/mesassoc/CAFMENAletters.htm#052199Egypt (retrieved July
30, 2004).

[352]
Authorities generally ignore classes taught in foreign languages so professors
in those fields described the classroom as a comparatively open environment for
discussion. Hoda al-Gindi, a professor of English literature at CairoUniversity,
said, "I've never been told what to teach or not. If it happened a number of us
would resign." Human Rights Watch
interview with Hoda al-Gindi, professor, English Department, Faculty of Arts, CairoUniversity,
Cairo, February
22, 2003. A professor who has taught at `AinShamsUniversity and a private Egyptian
university concurred. "The atmosphere is totally free. We have the luxury of
freedom to do a lot of different things. No one interferes with the content of
what we teach. We can bring in different perspectives." Human
Rights Watch interview with `AinShamsUniversity
professor, Cairo,
March 1, 2003. See also Human Rights Watch
interview with assistant lecturer, Faculty of Arts, Cairo University, Cairo,
February 17, 2003; Human Rights Watch
interview with professor of English and Comparative Literature, Faculty of
Arts, Cairo University, Cairo, March 4, 2003.

[355]
For example, Samia Mehrez said as an Egyptian she has more freedom on cultural
issues because "I am part of this culture and you can't tell me that I don't
know the culture." Human Rights Watch
interview with Samia Mehrez, associate professor, Department of Arabic Studies,
AUC, February 16, 2003.

[361]Human Rights Watch interview with
Emad Shahin, associate professor, Political Science Department, AUC, Cairo, February 18, 2003. See also Mustapha
Kamel al-Sayyid, professor, Political Science Department, Faculty of Economics
and Political Sciences, Cairo University, and Political Science Department,
AUC, Cairo, February 25, 2003 ("Ibrahim was a more political case, not [based
on] his lectures or books.").

[362]
"The professor's role centers basically on teaching. There is generally an
uncritical reliance on the West for research, training and teaching styles."
Hanada Taha-Thomure, Academic Freedom in
Arab Universities (New York: University
Press of America,
n.d.), p. 2.

[366]Not all academics sympathized with Abu Zaid. "Abu Zaid was crazy.
He knew he was doing things that aren't accepted, like walking naked in the
street. He's crazy and he hurts others' issues. He was wrong on that. He didn't
use common sense... ," said English professor Dalia El-Shayal, who herself is
not an Islamist and has spent time living in the United States. "I'm not saying
restrict yourself. If you don't want to do it [follow accepted mores], don't
live here." Human Rights Watch
interview with Dalia El-Shayal, assistant professor, English Department,
Faculty of Arts, CairoUniversity, Cairo,
February 27, 2003.

[377]Taha-Thomure lists several
institutional problems as "causes for the current state of academic freedom in
Arab countries" including "the large number of Arab students studying abroad,"
"the intellectual brain drain, that is, the emigration of the well-educated
Arabs to western nations," and "scarcity of research." Hanada Taha-Thomure,
Academic Freedom in Arab Universities, p. 8 and ch. 4.

[388]Human Rights Watch interview with
Ann Radwan, executive director, Binational Fulbright Commission, Cairo, February 20, 2003.
In recent years, students have been allowed to join a faculty with a lower
grade if they pay more. They usually do home study and take exams pass/fail.
While it generates income, the system has sparked some resentment. "If you have
two thousand places, you should fill them with students who got the grade
required by the state," recent graduate Ibrahim said. Human
Rights Watch interview with Tamir Sulaiman Ibrahim, Cairo, February 20, 2003.

[408]Human Rights Watch interview with
assistant lecturer, Faculty of Arts, CairoUniversity, Cairo, February 17, 2003. Some students
resort to photocopying books because they are expensive and not always
available. Some books, like dictionaries, are subsidized.

[409]Murtada outlined a different
five problems including the price of books, numbers of students, system of
exams, university guards, and increasing student bodywithout money or facilities. Human Rights Watch interview with Bassam Murtada, Cairo, February 28, 2003.

[413]Human Rights Watch interview with
Amina Rachid, professor, Department of French, Faculty of Arts, CairoUniversity,
Cairo, February
25, 2003. In addition, after she turns sixty years old she can no longer borrow
books. An assistant lecturer from CairoUniversity said, "I don't
have a library that covers my needs. I rely on AUC, but not everyone is allowed
in and you can't take books out." Human Rights Watch
interview with assistant lecturer, Faculty of Arts, CairoUniversity, Cairo, February 17, 2003.